With the €37,037 allowance that independent TDs designated as super-junior ministers in the incoming government would be permitted to maintain, they may potentially earn as much as the Taoiseach does in salary between pay and expenses, reports The Mirror.
Bertie Ahern introduced the Parliamentary Activities Allowance, formerly known as the Leaders Allowance, for independent deputies in 2001. Recipients are not required to provide receipts for their expenses, but they must submit an audited statement of those expenses annually to the Standards in Public Office Commission.
After Micheál Martin was elected Taoiseach today, two independent TDs, Sean Canney and Noel Grealish, are anticipated to be named super-junior ministers in the next Government, reports The Mirror.
As super-junior ministers, they will get an extra €62,046 on top of their TD salary of €113,697.
The independents requested that junior and super-junior ministers be permitted to keep their travel and lodging stipend during government discussions. This presently comes to about €30,500 annually for Mr. Grealish and Mr. Canney, reports The Mirror.
Independent TDs who get to the position of super-junior minister will still receive the €37,037 leader’s stipend, the Department of Public Expenditure confirmed to the Irish Mirror today.
This would increase their entire compensation and benefits package to about €243,280, which is higher than their senior ministerial colleagues who are full members of cabinet and only less than the Taoiseach’s pay of €243,895, reports The Mirror.
Mairead Farrell, TD for Sinn Féin, has criticised the super-junior ministers’ extraordinary pay and expense package, calling it “obscene.”
“A TD’s salary already places a recipient in the top six percent of income earners. When you add on the ministerial salary of circa €46,000 and super junior allowance of €16,000, you go higher up the income distribution again. We don’t need more wastage of public funds arising from negotiations with parties and individuals who have no significant policy or ideological differences. This is just them looking after themselves,” reports The Mirror.
“Many of the so-called independents entering government were elected on the back of anger at Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil self-interest and maintaining the status quo. Now they are going into government with Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil and, already, whatever supposed ‘independence’ they claimed to have had seems to have disappeared,” reports The Mirror.
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