Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 10 February 2010
75 Deputy Fergus O’Dowd asked the Minister for Transport, further to parliamentary Question No. 50 of 9 December 2009, the salary scales of the chief executives within all bodies, companies and agencies under the remit of his Department in 2008 and 2009, in view of the fact that they are not provided in annual reports and increases in salary payments are apparent; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6850/10]
Amharc ar fhreagraIn the case of commercial State bodies, the salary scales of chief executives are reviewed from time to time by the Minister for Finance and based on comparisons with posts in the private sector. Salary ranges recommended through this system, known as the Hay rates, were last approved by Government in 2007, with a further general sanction by the Department of Finance for revised pay ranges with effect from 1 September 2008. In some cases, chief executives are on non-Hay rates. These are primarily cases where chief executives had been already on salaries higher than the Hay rates and opted not to move to a Hay contract. Chief executives of non-commercial State companies and agencies come within the remit of the Review Body on Higher Remuneration and have been subject to the salary reductions provided for in the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (No. 2) Act 2009.
The Minister for Finance has indicated his concerns about top-level pay across the economy and has moved already in addressing this in the non-commercial sector. He has also confirmed that he will carry out a review of the pay of chief executives of the commercial State companies, including the transport companies. I understand he will be announcing proposals in this regard in the near future.
I have asked my Department to provide the Deputy with the salary scales and ranges for the chief executives in tabular form.
That reply represents a significant change since 9 December 2009. When I asked the Minister the same question on that date, he told me to look at the annual reports. The figures are not in the annual reports. We need more accountability. I welcome the fact that we are now at last to receive the figures.
Will the Minister request that figures be provided regarding those who report to the chief executives at the highest level, that is, at board level or just below it? We need more accountability from them. The remuneration of the chief executive of Dublin Airport Authority in 2007, the last year for which figures are available, was almost €700,000 per annum. I presume he was making some hay on that salary. Has this salary remained the same?
Is it the case that the pay cuts may not apply to chief executives subject to the pay rates described by the Minister? Is this a fair question? We need total transparency and accountability.
Is the Minister pleased or unhappy to hear that while most harbour authorities have informed the Joint Committee on Transport of the salaries of their chief executives, Shannon Foynes Port Company refuses to provide it with the salaries of the chief executive and harbour master and other companies such as that in Cork will not tell us how much they are paying their executives. State companies, particularly those in which the Minister is the main shareholder, and semi-State companies under his control that he subsidises and which report to him, must be absolutely accountable.
A balance must be struck. While the salaries of public representatives and their actions are open to scrutiny, I wonder whether prurient interest in what a fellow is earning because he happens to be in a port company is desirable.
It is not prurient.
I am not accusing the Deputy of that but saying a certain amount of privacy should be afforded to most people who are not public representatives. A public representative should have a certain amount of privacy also. Although we continually——
Public servants.
——decide to erode this, that is another question.
As I said in my response, the pay cuts applied to the chief executives of non-commercial State companies and agencies within the remit——
They do not apply to the commercial companies.
They do not at present and that is why the Minister for Finance has decided to have a review of the commercial companies.
From 1 September, the pay scale of a chief executive of Dublin Airport Authority has been from €287,413 at the bottom end to €359,320 at the higher level. This is the actual pay rate.
There are also bonuses. The bonus for the chief executive of Dublin Airport Authority in 2007 was €167,000. He also got fees of €17,000, pension contributions and other taxable benefits worth €181,000. My interest is not prurient in that we need to know what chief executives of State or semi-State companies are paid. I welcome the fact that we will. We need to know a lot more about the salaries. My interest is based on the lack of accountability of bodies under the remit of the Minister. Some are not accountable. Some companies do not report to the Comptroller and Auditor General, yet they spend an awful lot of money.
Very serious questions are being asked about what is going on in CIE. There are allegations of extremely serious fraud in the company, yet we received a letter today stating the auditors will not appear before the Joint Committee on Transport to be accountable for what is happening. The problem is that we are spending a fortune subsidising State and semi-State companies. They are not accountable at present in terms of their salaries and they remain unaccountable in terms of audits, reports of audits and secret audits that they will not tell us about but which show up abuse of public funds.
That there is a certain set of procedures applicable to the companies that must compete in a commercial way and produce reports in the same way as any private commercial company does not mean there is a conspiracy.
I am talking about fraud.
The Deputy's implication and tone, which may have been unintentional, indicates he believes there is a big conspiracy, that much taxpayers' money is being wasted——
Yes, absolutely.
——and that nobody is doing anything about it. That is a totally false picture. The only reason the commercial State companies are not within the remit of the Comptroller and Auditor General is they act under company law. They are fully audited and must be audited. They are commercial and there are competition issues.
We cannot see the audit results.
There is no big deal about it from any point of view. The audit report about which the Deputy is talking has been made available publicly, as has the Baker Tilly report on CIE.
With regard to the question of prurient interest, Deputy O'Dowd is absolutely correct. I apologise to him if he believes I was saying the salaries of chairpersons or chief executives of State bodies should not be made public. They should be made public, as should the bonuses. I have no difficulty with that. My point related to people working in the offices, harbour masters and those on salary scales lower than those of chief executive officers. One must balance a person's right to privacy with the public right to information.
That concludes priority questions.
