asked the Minister for the Public Service if the executives of any State or semi-State companies are exempt from the terms of the national wage agreement; and, if so, if he will make a statement on the matter.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - National Wage Agreement.
22.
There is no provision in the national agreement for the exemption of the staff of State or semi-State bodies from its terms and the Government have for their part made it clear that they regard the national agreements as covering all categories of employees.
Could the Minister explain to me how the increase given to Parliamentary Secretaries complies with the terms of the agreement?
That is a separate question surely.
State employees.
The question relates to the executives of any State or semi-State company. If the Deputy wants a detailed explanation I can give it to him, but, briefly, the position is that by the application of a number of different formulae on the last occasion the Parliamentary Secretaries received a rate of increase which was greater than that received by others. Taking the two together they work out at the same rate as that for everybody else.
£80 for the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Social Welfare and £2,000 for the Minister.
The Deputy is making statements rather than asking questions.
They got £300 in excess of the rate on the last occasion.
It is a downgrading of the Parliamentary Secretaries of the Minister's Government.
No. That is quite wrong. It was as a consequence of the application of the findings of the Employer-Labour Conference to which the previous Administration referred the whole issue that there was a variation, an excess in one case and a pull-back in the second case, so that equality was reached. The formulae were not ours. They were those that were achieved by the reference of the previous Government.