THE GOVERNMENT yesterday confirmed that a 1 per cent payment available to middle managers across all Government departments will remain in place.
Taoiseach Brian Cowen and Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan defended bonus payments totalling over €200,000 paid to senior staff in the Department of Finance between 2008 and 2010. The payments have been given as part of core pay across all other Government departments since 1999.
The Department of Finance also confirmed yesterday that while the final decision has yet to be taken, additional bonuses will certainly be paid for this year as to refuse to do so would be to renege on the pay agreement dating back to 1994 and implemented since 1999.
Mr Lenihan’s spokesman has also rejected criticism from the union representing bank workers that the Taoiseach and Mr Lenihan have been inconsistent in preventing bonuses being paid to AIB employees while approving bonus payments for staff in the Department of Finance and other Government bodies, including Horse Racing Ireland, the Personal Injuries Assessment Board and Waterways Ireland.
Larry Broderick of the Irish Bank Officials Association said yesterday: “The very arguments which the Minister for Finance is seeking to circumvent through the introduction of legislation in the case of AIB appear to be the same ones being used to support the payment of additional awards to staff in the Department of Finance and elsewhere, namely that these awards are payable under contract.”
A parliamentary reply to Fine Gael TD Fergus O’Dowd this week disclosed that some 27 Department of Finance staff at principal and assistant principal level, received special payments for 2009 in the amount of €55,000. The reply also stated that some 19 members of staff at the same level received payments in 2008, amounting to €53,394. This year, according to the reply, some 52 principal and assistant principal officers received seniority allowances totalling €115,395.
The same series of responses gave details of a €31,395 bonus in 2009 to Patricia Byron, CEO of the Personal Injuries Assessment Board; a bonus of €40,000 in the same year paid to CEO of Horse Racing Ireland Brian Kavanagh; and a bonus of almost €10,000 to the head of Waterways Ireland John Martin for 2007.
Mr Lenihan’s spokesman said yesterday that the 1 per cent was incorporated as part of the pay rate in every other department except the Department of Finance, where it remained a bonus or merit payment, or a seniority payment in some instances.
The spokesman said the total paid to each individual was between €2,000 and €2,500 and that was fully subject to tax. He also said that only 27 of over 200 people working at that grade in the department were paid the bonus in 2009. He said while the decision has yet to be taken on payment of the bonuses in 2010, he expects them to be paid. “Otherwise, you would have to undo the 1994 agreement not just in finance but in every other government department, where it has become part of pay.
“Officials at that grade have already taken a drop of 17 per cent in income. If it was withdrawn, it would in effect mean a drop of 18 per cent in income for everybody working at that grade.”
The Association of Higher Civil and Public Servants also defended the payments, saying they were part of the Programme for Competitiveness and Work – dating back to 1994.
Mr O’Dowd yesterday criticised what he called the bonus culture in government departments and agencies. “Brian Lenihan presided over a bonus bonanza by allowing extra payments to certain public sector staff, while imposing a general bonus freeze across most of the public sector,” he said.