An Independent TD said yesterday that she will use her Dáil salary to finance a special secretariat in her constituency if she wins a seat in the European parliament in June.
Ms Marian Harkin said if she is elected for the North- West constituency she will not resign her Sligo-Leitrim Dáil seat until the next general election. However, she will live on her European salary only. She will appoint extra secretaries - in addition to the one she already has - to deal with the increased workload. Ms Harkin said she would have about €45,000 left to fund an enlarged secretariat, after tax was paid on her basic Dáil salary of €80,457.
Ms Harkin announced her plan after Senator Jim Higgins, a European candidate for Fine Gael, levelled an accusation of greed against any TD intending to hold on to their Dáil seat if they were successful in Europe.
If elected as an MEP, he will not surrender his Seanad seat, which carries a salary of €56,320, because Fine Gael might not retain it if he quits, he said.
Ms Harkin hit back angrily at the "greed accusation".
"What annoyed me was the accusation of greed," she said. "I'm quite prepared to meet the issue of a second salary head-on.
"What I intend to do if I am elected to Europe - and the accounts will be in the public arena like they are for everybody else - is to use my Dáil salary to employ extra staff because it's a huge constituency and there is a lot of extra work involved."
She said on North West radio: "I had thought about not collecting the Dáil salary at all, but then I would be simply handing it back to the Government and I thought 'No, I will take it, but I will employ extra staff to service the constituency'."
Later she said she would use Dáil attendance and mileage allowances to finance her travel between Sligo and Dublin and to pay the rent on an apartment she uses a number of days a week in Dublin.
Ms Harkin asked were Senator Higgins's comments now Fine Gael policy. Do Fine Gael TDs Mr Gay Mitchell and Mr Simon Coveney, who are running for Europe in Dublin and Munster respectively, intend to surrender their Dáil seats immediately if they win in June? Or do they intend holding both seats and collecting both salaries?
Senator Higgins said his initial comments were not directed at any particular individual. However, they had obviously touched a raw nerve in the case of Ms Harkin.
Under existing legislation a politician may not hold a Dáil and a European seat at the same time. Nevertheless, if someone is already a TD when elected as an MEP, they are not required to resign their Dáil seat until the next election.