Sir, – Paying indecently large sums of money to top civil servants, bankers and politicians upon retirement or dismissal seems to be endemic and irreversible in Ireland.
There are too many people in our society who expect these large rewards upon retirement even when they have failed or damaged our economy. These generous sums of money (be they either pensions or payoffs) are vulgar, immoral and totally unethical. How else can any decent person in Irish society see it? Prime Time recently revealed handicapped, aged and worst of all, young helpless children being deprived of the kind of assistance that would greatly help them achieve a lifetime of essential care.
I therefore propose the following; all of those people in receipt of these large, unaffordable sums of money immediately return 25 per cent of these funds to the exchequer. If anyone doubts this refund is unjustified, they should just look around at the less fortunate in our society; our country cannot afford it, so they should hand it back.
If there are not enough people volunteering to do this humanitarian deed, then we should hold a referendum to support some urgent changes. Should it succeed, and I believe it would, then all those unaffordable payouts should be cut by 75 per cent retrospectively. This would only apply to those who failed to hand back the 25 per cent. The reclaimed money would go a long way to relieving the awful plight of those unfortunate people highlighted by our national television almost on a weekly basis. – Yours, etc,