Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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280. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform if he will set out in tabular form the yield from the public service pension reduction in each year since its introduction; the number of people subject to the PSPR; the projected yield in 2014 and 2015; his plans to amend the PSPR; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32441/14]

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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The Public Service Pension Reduction (PSPR) was introduced on 1 January 2011 under the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Act 2010. PSPR is an actual reduction of pension, rather than a levy or deduction from pension. This means there is no actual flow of funds to the Exchequer or to the public finances generally from PSPR, and therefore there is no annual time series of PSPR inflows.

In each of the years 2011 and 2012, PSPR saved an estimated €100 million for the public finances in the shape of reduced public service pension outgo. The saving in the year 2013 is estimated to have been about €113 million, reflecting in particular increased PSPR rates and wider PSPR application from 1 July 2013 under the terms of the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Act 2013.  The projected saving in each of the years 2014 and 2015 is €125 million.

Pensioners with public service pension income below €12,000 are in all cases exempt from PSPR. A higher exemption threshold of €32,500 applies to pension awards to persons who have retired since the end of February 2012. In overall terms PSPR is estimated to affect the pensions of about 90,000 persons.

Under section 12 of the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Act 2013, I am required to review the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Acts 2009-2013 annually and cause a written report of my findings to be laid before each House of the Oireachtas. As part of that review I am required to consider whether the various measures, including the PSPR, continue to be necessary, having regard to the purposes of the legislation. My last such report was laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas in June 2014. In that report I concluded, inter alia, that PSPR continued to be necessary, and I have no plans to amend it at present.