Madam, – If I decided that instead of paying my taxes I was going to donate them to charity, it would not be very long before I found myself in trouble with the Revenue. Yet this is what Michael Noonan is doing with his pension of €30,000 a year, which he has been claiming in addition to salary and expenses of €100,000 a year as a sitting TD (Home News, December 29th).
This decision displays a breathtakingly arrogant attitude to public money and demonstrates that Mr Noonan still has not grasped the enormous anger than exists about the inflated salaries, pensions and expenses that continue to be paid to politicians and senior public servants while the IMF and the ECB are parked in Government Buildings.
Worthy as it may appear, the money that Mr Noonan donates to charity is not his own. It has to be paid for from the taxes of those hard-pressed workers still fortunate enough to have jobs. And his decision will not save the exchequer a red cent as the Government struggles with a public deficit of almost €19 billion.
Mr Noonan is talked about as a future Minister for Finance. With a record such as this, I regard the prospect with the same degree of apprehension as a hare regards the gaping mouth of the oncoming hound. – Yours, etc,