Few parliamentarians anywhere in the world are quite as well paid as the members of the Oireachtas now are. And even fewer parliaments can claim such a high ratio of office-holders to elected members as Dáil Éireann now boasts. Between them, the Government parties have 86 TDs, of whom 35 have ministerial responsibilities: 15 are cabinet members and 20 are junior ministers. All told, it means that some 41 per cent of all the TDs who sit on the Fianna Fáil, Green Party and PD benches in Leinster House hold ministerial office in some form.
The Government, through its latest proposal to create some additional Oireachtas committees, will also further tighten its grip on the Dáil. Almost all the 21 or so committees, when established, will have Coalition backbenchers as paid chairpersons. And, by then, over half of all TDs from the three coalition parties may either hold ministerial office, or serve as chairperson of a parliamentary committee.
As Labour's deputy leader, Joan Burton, pointed out in the Dáil last week in relation to the excessive number of junior ministers: "Not even members of the Government, who work with them, know what they do, apart from seven or eight important jobs." And she was equally scathing about the proliferation of Oireachtas committees and the Government's plans to create three more.
In June, after the Government was formed, three extra minister-of-state posts were added. Over the past three decades, the number of junior ministers has trebled, but without good reason and to little beneficial public effect. Currently, five junior ministers have responsibility for aspects of the Education portfolio, while four juniors ministers are similarly employed in Health; a misallocation of manpower and resources.
The salary of a junior minister is €147,284 and that of a TD is €101,446. This is far more than an MP at Westminster receives and the widening pay differential is very hard to justify. The Dáil deputy who serves as the chairperson of an Oireachtas committee receives an extra €15,706 for that work while a deputy chairperson and a committee convenor are also paid. Certainly they are amply, many would argue excessively, rewarded for their efforts.
Too many of the 20 junior ministers have no clear role or responsibility, while for a national parliament of its size the 21 parliamentary committees, mainly headed by Government backbenchers, are an ineffective way for the legislature to hold the executive to proper public scrutiny and account. There is no need for 20 junior ministers when seven sufficed up to 1977. Today, 15 at most would be adequate. Likewise, with the Oireachtas committees: for there, too, less is more.