Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

We are entitled, as I will continue to repeat until we get a satisfactory answer, to know what kind of remuneration the Department proposes to give to people who are commissioners. The role of commissioner is a highly responsible job. It is not the same as sitting at a board meeting of Aer Lingus or some such company and making decisions once a month. It is taking responsibility for the quality of our Judiciary and applying one's mind to making sure that the name of one person rather than another person is put on a shortlist of three names for Cabinet approval. That is not something which will be done lightly, easily or without serious consideration being given to the merits of all the applicants.

If the remuneration is €9,000 a year, which is €4,500 after tax for somebody who has reached the dizzy heights of the higher rate of income tax, one can bet one's bottom dollar that the consultants will do all the hard work and evaluations and the poor bedraggled commissioners will come to a meeting once a month where the lay chairperson will put before them a summary document, with the names of those whom the consultants have thought worthwhile. These will be the people who have gone past the first stage. The same consultants will no doubt have decided who has fallen at the first fence and who should be coming towards the finishing line. It will then be up to the commissioners to select as between candidates one, two and three. That is the dismal, pathetic role envisaged for these commissioners as a fig leaf to one Minister's desire that there should be a radical change.

If the remuneration is to be €9,000 or €4,500 after tax - if that is really what is involved - the commissioners will get €400 an outing if the commission meets once a month and approximately €130 an outing if it meets once a fortnight. If we are talking about that kind of money for important work of this kind and also authorising the evaluation process to be carried out by consultants, then this is an elaborate sham and should be condemned as such. I have no doubt members of the Judiciary, who will not be remunerated, and the practitioner appointees will be far more attentive than the lay people if that is to be the remuneration package for doing this important work. Will they end up earning less than the so-called consultants who will advise them on this matter? Is that what will happen? It will be very poor consultants who will turn up for a meeting of one or two hours' duration to be asked questions about their evaluations if the remuneration is €400. We are entitled to know what the Department of Justice and Equality intends awarding these people. Until the Minister can answer that question, he should not insult our intelligence by assuring us that it will all work out on the night and everything will be fine.

If it ends up that the net benefit to the commissioner for sitting and listening to this stuff is less than that received by the consultant who has pored over the documents and come up with an evaluation, we will know exactly where the real effort will be made and who will operate the real levers of power in this whole process. It will be the consultants. Remember that the people who will do most of the evaluation work will be the consultants, who will be appointed with ministerial consent only. Where is the independence in that case? It will have gone out the window.

I strongly urge the Minister to avail of the opportunity and shorten this debate by telling us what he envisages will be the remuneration of the proposed commissioners. Will they get €9,000, €20,000, €30,000 or €40,000 per annum or something in that order in order that the House can determine whether it should give them the functions it is proposed to give them or whether we are, in effect, giving third party contractors, consultants and advisers the steering wheel in this whole process and the function of making the important evaluation decisions in the first place?

I would like to hear an answer to the points I have just made. I also need clarity as to how this process will work. Will the Government learn the names of the applicants who were rejected?