Richard Boyd Barrett condemns secretarial pay for former Taoiseach

Yeah, Taoiseach, apologies, I was just a bit delay getting in. Do you want to take a breath or do you want to? I know, I know, I know what I want to say. Taoiseach, look, it sticks in the craw of people in a big, big way. The really staggeringly high and generous pension entitlements of former Taoiseach and ministers, particularly, it's worth saying, those who were elected to Dail Eireann under the pre-2012 regime, because there was changes made in 2011-12 under the impact of austerity, but it really sticks in people's crawls. So it's quite extraordinary that you would add to that by granting very significant amounts of money to former Taoiseach in addition to those pensions for secretarial support when that had been abolished at that period, I think, and then reinstate them. I mean, what possible justification for it? Do you not think they're already in receipt of extremely generous pension packages, and then hundreds of thousands, I think, in the case of former Taoiseach Gohearn, given to them in secretarial support? I just don't see how you could possibly justify it, and it really sticks in the craw of people out there who are struggling to pay bills, to pay mortgages, to pay rent, that these excessively generous pensions are topped up with even, with very significant hundreds of thousands of euros in secretarial assistance and in VIP treatment for former Taoiseach at airports. It's just not really acceptable Taoiseach. Thank you. Thank you, Mike. Next. Thank you, deputies, for their questions and contributions. Former Taoiseach and indeed former presidents do have an ongoing role, and as I think was mentioned, that ongoing role can be beneficial to the country. Mary Robinson was mentioned, for example, in her role around climate action and climate change isn't just good for the world, it also reflects well in our country. And I think we should be cognizant of that. And I think it makes sense that if we have former officeholders, former teachers, former presidents, that we should ask them to assist the country. There are people who are generally held in good standing internationally, who have good contacts, who know things, and have great experience. And I think we should see them as an asset to the country, not to the government, but to the country, if they're willing to continue to do things for the country. I should point out that they're all also members of the Council of State for life, so they do have a formal role under the Constitution. Being a retired Taoiseach is not a formal role, but being a member of the Council of State is. And they continue to receive a huge amount of correspondence, a huge amount of media queries relating to their work, queries from historians, and even queries from inquiries. So, even unwanted, they receive a huge amount of correspondence and queries and so on. And they have been asked to assist in our UN work, particularly in relation to the campaign for a seat on the Security Council, on European issues such as Brexit, explaining our case and our issues in forums around the world, and also on occasion in Northern Ireland. And just to mention one or two others, former Taoiseach Bertie O'Hearn has a role in monitoring the referendum in Papua New Guinea, a really important role. And we should be supportive of him in that. In my very brief phone call that I had with the new Prime Minister of Australia, one of the first things he mentioned to me was that your former Taoiseach was involved in this referendum in Bougainville, in PNG. You know, and it wasn't something I brought up, it was something that the Australian Prime Minister was aware of and volunteered. So that just gives an example of the benefit of that sort of soft power of having your people and your citizens around the world doing this kind of work. Former Thomas Damon Gilmour has a role with the EU around human rights, which has been very effective. And while it's an EU role, the fact that it's being done by an Irish person does reflect well on us. And everyone will be familiar with former Taoiseach John Bruton's ongoing engagement in European affairs and US relations given his role as EU ambassador to the US in the past. I know there was mention of large amounts of money and hundreds of thousands of euros just to say once again that secretary of assistance is vouched. And the total cost of this scheme so far this year has been 21,190 euros for all office holders combined. The previous scheme, which was abolished in 2012, cost about £168,000 to £183,000 a year. So it really is very modest compared to what was there before. All four former Taoiseach were contacted to make them aware of the assistance available, the rules and specifically that any work had to be associated with their former role. The decision to avail of supports is entirely at the discretion of each individual and they're under no obligation to make use of it. In fact, so far only one former Taoiseach has elected to recruit a secretary assistant and the same individual has made one request for detailed briefing material in relation to Brexit. I take Debbie Allen's point on transparency and I'm absolutely willing to be as transparent as we possibly can be. But the GDPR did actually change things. Our privacy laws in Ireland are different to what they were a few years ago. And while it was possible in the past to disclose, for example, how much every individual office holder got in terms of their pension and so on, under GDPR there are new privacy rights and they apply to every citizen. And it's no longer possible now for a government to disclose what any individual public servant gets paid in terms of their pension or in terms of their salary. Now we could remove that for everyone or no one. But that previous system where it's transparent for some and not others no longer applies in GDPR has changed that. Thank you. Thank you. You