Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein)
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Question 23: To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation his views on whether Forfás having pay costs that are more than four times greater than the county enterprise boards represents value for money. [27323/12]

Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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Forfás has responsibility for the pension costs of retired staff of Forfás, IDA Ireland, Enterprise Ireland, Science Foundation Ireland and certain other former agencies under the Industrial Development Acts 1993 to 2003. The 2012 Revised Estimates for Public Services makes provision for an allocation of €47.349 million to Forfás this year for Pay and Pensions under Subhead A3 of my Department's Vote. The detailed Agency Statement for Forfás in the Revised Estimates Volume shows that only €6.769 million of this allocation is for pay purposes, while €40.58 million is for pension purposes. The City and County Enterprise Boards have a pay allocation of €7.143 million for 2012, and an additional pension allocation of €414,000.

In total, Forfás is responsible for paying the pension entitlements of approximately 1,200 retired agency staff and so any comparison of their costs with the pay and pensions costs of the City and County Enterprise Boards is inappropriate.