I am happy to agree with the House and with you, Sir, because the principle of these recommendations is substantially the same. I put down these recommendations to alter the amount of the increase in respect of each increase that is allowed under the Bill, and instead of the magnitude of the increases which is proposed in the Bill—they stretch from the lowest which is a shade less than 50 per cent up to nearly 200 per cent in some cases—I am suggesting that the increases should be more of the order of ten per cent all round. I move recommendation No. 1:
In subsection (1), line 33, to delete "£2,500" and substitute "£1,650".
On Second Stage I made the point that if a trade union going before the Labour Court puts in a plea for an increase in salaries or wages, the order of magnitude asked for by organised labour is something like 15 per cent and the reply from the employers is generally that five per cent or six per cent should be enough in "these difficult and crucial times". The Labour Court itself usually comes down in the neighbourhood of 10 per cent; and it is with these thoughts in mind that I put down these amendments whereby, by the terms of the first of these, under section 3, Deputies, instead of having their allowances increased from £1,500 to £2,500 would have them increased by 10 per cent only to £1,650. This seems to me to be a legitimate amount to allow, even if we accept all the arguments put forward for these increases.
I would be prepared to concede the point in argument that a stronger case can be made for some Deputies and Senators than for others by reason of the fact that they may have heavier commitments and also that in relation to their total incomes the Parliamentary allowance represents a bigger proportion than in the case of others. However, in order to apply this principle we would have to accept the principle of the means test. I tried to have that principle accepted on Second Stage but was not successful; I tried to put down a means test amendment here but it has been ruled outside the scope of the Bill, and I do not contest that ruling. If I want to have the increase reduced to 10 per cent instead of 66? per cent or 200 per cent within the scope of the Bill, I have to suggest an overall percentage which in some cases would hit Deputies and Senators harder than in others. That is the result of the scope of this Bill which was brought before us without any discrimination being made between those who may be severely hit and those less severely hit by reason of the fact that their other income is higher.
It has been said, and it was said by the Minister, that unless substantial increases are made in these allowances we shall not be able to attract the best talent into the Dáil and Seanad. In another connection it has been said in the other House that with higher allowances they are likely to get a better type of candidate in elections and consequently a better type of Deputy. This seems to me to be a little offensive to the present Members of the Dáil and the Seanad, because of the implication that our quality can be greatly improved and that this can be achieved by holding out the glittering prize of more money. I objected to that on Second Stage, and I am giving effect to that objection by suggesting that we ought all be quite satisfied with a 10 per cent rise. The result of accepting my amendment will be that in each case.
It is suggested that members of certain professions are not attracted to politics, by reason of the fact that in those professions they can earn quite a lot more than they could earn even as a Minister in the present Dáil, and that, therefore, the allowances for Ministers should go up by much more than the ten per cent that I am suggesting in these amendments. It occurs to me that this competition with, say, the fees earned by senior members of the legal profession which are perhaps too high within our present society, is most harmful. In saying that I know that I am treading on dangerous ground. In this House or, indeed, in the other House, if one says anything in the slightest degree critical of the legal profession one is likely to get into trouble on all sides. Lawyers spring up all over the place to tell you (a) that most lawyers are earning very little, they are an impoverished tribe, and (b) to confirm the fact that present ministerial salaries would be unattractive to them compared with the very little they are now earning.
It is true, of course, that there is a large disparity in the legal profession and in other professions between what is earned at the top and what is earned in the lower reaches, but I would ask the House to consider whether we are happy about this comparison. We are told that all of us must be paid more, and TDs must be paid more, and Ministers must be paid more, because otherwise we will not be able to attract people who can, in fact, earn £5,000, £6,000 or £10,000 a year practising as barristers, for instance. I speak of the legal profession, but there are others in a similar situation. Are we quite happy about that? Are we satisfied that the way in which our society distributes rewards which can be measured in money is equitable? Are we satisfied that we are succeeding —and I adopt the phrase of Senator FitzGerald—in narrowing the differentials or are we broadening the differentials between the vast mass of the Irish people, together with the rank and file in many professions and the highly-paid, the moneyed classes, the well-off classes, the well-paid politicians? Is the gap not being made wider, and should we not on the contrary be pleased if we find the gap is narrowing?
The Minister might legitimately say that whether or not there is anything in this argument of mine it is not within his power to reduce the scale of fees earned by practising barristers. This is true, but I draw attention to the fact that in our commercial society, in our society of free enterprise based on the profit motive, an essentially materialistic society, one of the results of this commercial, I might say money-pursuing society, is that the rate of fees that can be afforded by our large industrial and commercial companies in defence of their private interests in the law courts, the scale of fees that they can afford to pay, tends to condition our whole society and is one of the factors at least in this proposal in the Bill to overpay Senators, to overpay TDs, to overpay Ministers, to overpay the Attorney General, the Taoiseach, the Leaders of the Opposition and the others. In other words, this tendency to overpay results from something which I think is not good, I shall not use a stronger adjective, in the commercial and materialistic state which we have allowed to develop in this free Republic of ours. In other words, we are allowing ourselves far too much to be conditioned by the notion of private profit and major money gains.
The Bill is asking for a 66? per cent increase in allowances for TDs although the TDs got a large increase four years ago. It is asking for a 50 per cent increase for Senators although we got a significant increase four years ago. It is asking for an increase of similar dimensions for the Taoiseach and the Ministers. The increase, unless my mathematics are letting me down, for the Taoiseach is something like 66?. The increase for the Ministers is a shade less, something like 62 per cent. It was brought out here last time and I might advert to it again that the Ministers are getting a double increase. I speak open to correction but I think I am right in saying that the Ministers are getting an extra £1,000 a year as TDs and an extra £1,300 a year as Ministers. This is a fairly big whack. In future the figure that will usually be quoted, if we pass this Bill unamended, as being the Minister's allowance or salary will be what is mentioned in the Bill, £3,500, and the public as a rule will not do the little piece of mental arithmetic of adding to this sum the increased amount the Minister will be getting as a TD. I speak open to correction but I think I am right in saying that both of these will be drawn by all Ministers, that is to say, they will get £6,000 a year, and that under this Bill they are getting a double increase, an increase as a TD and an increase as a Minister.
This is the Bill that is before us and that we are being asked to underwrite in front of the nation, in front of the people to whom we say: "If you are an old age pensioner or a widow with £169 a year you are too well off to get an old age pension or a non-contributory widow's pension". The differential between them and us is very big, indeed, and I feel that the Seanad in its own conscience would feel a lot happier if it were to adopt my amendments which grant a ten per cent increase to all of us, but reject the Government's proposal, backed by all Parties in the Dáil, of percentage increases in the case of TDs and Senators ranging up to 66? per cent, and in other cases of 200%.
It was said the other day, in a paragraph in one of our newspapers that by our action last week of delaying the Committee Stage for a week we in the Seanad had saved the Exchequer something in the order of £6,000. In view of the fact that the Minister has just told us that the total cost in a year would be something like £200,000 perhaps what we saved by this week's meditation has even been rather over £6,000. I think we saved £6,000 on the increases proposed for TDs and Senators alone. I might say I met a Member of the Lower House last week, a friend of mine, and he said: "You cost me £20 the other night".
