Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

The Deputy may take it that the Government will move to ensure we have a pensions regime in this country that does not make managers rich and pensioners poor. We want to ensure that consumers get value for every euro they put into their pension schemes. We cannot tolerate a situation where the pensions industry takes too big a share out of the consumer's pension, especially when the State is providing tax breaks to support pension provision.

The Government is determined to get public and private sector pensions on a more sustainable footing. We want to ensure the money the State spends, including the tax reliefs that are provided for pensions, are more fairly distributed. The Government will take decisions on this and those decisions will be informed decisions. That is why the study is being conducted. It is not being conducted as some kind of academic exercise; it is being conducted to inform well-grounded decisions which Government will make on this matter. If there are legislative implications arising from those decisions, those legislative implications will be brought before the House.

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