Germany putting the foot down

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/german-mps-shock-at-level-of-tds-pay-1676069.html

German MP's shock at level of TDs' pay

He gets €57,000 less in wages and allowances

By Michael Brennan
Wednesday March 18 2009

FINANCE Minister Brian Lenihan has signalled his intention to clean up Ireland's financial sector.
But he might be advised to take a look closer to home -- at our top-heavy political system -- in his drive to secure badly needed savings.
One German MP has expressed amazement at the salaries paid to our politicians and senior civil servants.
Hans Joachim Fuchtel was paid €92,000 to represent 280,000 people in Germany's Black Forest region, while our TDs get more than €100,000 to represent 25,000 people each.
"My constituency is 280,000 people. For a member of the Irish parliament, it's smaller but the salaries seem to be much better," he told the Irish Independent.
Mr Fuchtel is also limited to claiming a maximum of €44,400 in taxable expenses every year, whereas our TDs claim about €67,000 each.
He also gets an annual grant of €14,000 to pay for his staff -- yet TDs are supplied with both a full-time secretary and a parliamentary researcher at a cost to the taxpayer of at least €40,000. Overall that means he receives around €57,000 less in wages, expenses and allowances than his Irish equivalent.

Surprised
During his visit for St Patrick's Day day, Mr Fuchtel said Irish people might be surprised to learn that Irish politicians were paid far more than their German counterparts.
"And it's the same with our Chancellor Angela Merkel -- she has a €250,000 salary. She doesn't have as much as the head of a middle-sized bank -- it's very modest."
Taoiseach Brian Cowen is paid €257,024, but this will be reduced by the 9.6pc public sector pension levy which applies to the highest earners.
Mr Fuchtel is a member of the German Parliament's powerful finance committee and is known as the 'King of the Black Forest' for his record in being re-elected continuously since 1987.
He supplements his income through working as a divorce lawyer -- but says that most of the 635 German MPs in the Bundestag (German Parliament) are full-time politicians.
"If you have another job, you have to declare everything to your parliament president and then everybody can read it on the internet," he said.
A letter writer to the Irish Independent last week quoted an article from one of Germany's leading national newspapers, 'Die Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung'.
It wrote that the German government had been taking a precautionary look at the Irish budgetary arrangements under the magnifying glass.
It said German officials had discovered "the Irish prime minister earns three times as much as the German chancellor" and that "there is a lot of room for economising".
Although their figures are incorrect (Mr Cowen's salary is not three times more than Ms Merkel's), it is a signal that Germany is not willing to provide a blank cheque for any financial bailout of the Irish state.
Mr Fuchtel said Germans wanted to see other countries take measures to deal with their own economic difficulties.
But he said cutting the salaries of Irish politicians would not be a condition for any German bailout.
- Michael Brennan

SUB ARTICLE
http://www.independent.ie/opinion/letters/germans-dont-want-to-pay-for-irish-greed-1671575.html

Germans don't want to pay for Irish greed


Friday March 13 2009

The following excerpt from one of Germany's leading national newspapers ('Die Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung', March 2, by author Nikolas Busse) should be of interest in Ireland:

"Though they don't say much about it in public, the prime-ministerial offices are thinking about what will happen if a euro country gets into a situation where it can't pay its way.

"Ireland and Greece are the prime candidates and, especially in the land of the fatigued Celtic Tiger, there seems to be a growing expectation that Germany would help out.

"In Berlin, they have been taking a precautionary look at the Irish budgetary arrangements under the magnifying glass and have discovered that the Irish prime minister earns three times as much as the German chancellor and that even departmental heads are getting more than the head of the German government.

"There is after all, they feel, a lot of room for economising there yet." The justified sarcasm is evident.

Taoiseach Brian Cowen and his grossly overpaid cronies right across the public services (and I do not mean the lower ranks) are not only making a laughing stock of Ireland internationally, but by their blind greed are creating a situation where economic help needed by the ordinary people of the country, who are bearing "the pain" on their own, might not be forthcoming. Shame!

James N O'Sullivan
Hamburg, Germany

I am disappointed that Richie Boucher has been appointed as CEO of Bank of Ireland.

I have no reason to doubt either Mr Boucher's integrity or ability.

Indeed, perhaps at any other time he might very well have proved to be the right appointee.

However, in the current parlous times the perception both here in Ireland and internationally is that a new broom is required in all Irish banks.

And, unfortunately, it is easy to perceive Mr Boucher's appointment in the current fraught economic climate as falling under the category of jobs for the boys.

In the circumstances, if only for the sake of outside perceptions, the Bank of Ireland might have been better advised to appoint an outsider.