Carlow Kilkenny’s Malcolm Noonan is defending the role of his new advisor.
Yesterday it was revealed that the Green Minister of State for Heritage and Electoral Reform was one of ten juniors in line for a new political advisor.
Previously, Ministers of State were told that they would have to share a pool of advisers, and this sparked a backlash from some.
This morning, Minister Noonan told KCLR that the advisory role was policy focused on leading issues such as the town centre’s first policy.
Labour Leader Alan Kelly doesn’t agree though that the advisors are needed saying “I don’t have an issue, you know, with a certain amount of senior advisors, I think it’s ridiculous the amount that the Taoiseach, the Tanaiste and Minister Ryan have, 16 advisors between the three of them is a joke, but I have no issue for instance with, you know, Minister Coveney, the ministers for public expenditure or finance or anybody else having their advisors but junior minsters don’t need advisors as far as I’m concerned”
The Sinn Fein leader says the timing of the Government’s decision to grant special advisors to 10 junior ministers shows how out of touch it is.
The announcement was made yesterday, the same day over 200,000 people had their pandemic unemployment payment cut.
In the last Dail, advisors were paid a minimum of €67,000 a year.
Mary Lou McDonald says the Government already employs an excessive amount of advisors commenting “Good advice is necessary, so is value for money and I have to say it should be bourne in mind that people in government have the entire apparatus of the state, the civil service, the public service, there’s no great sense or evidence of quality of advice given how bumbling this government is and I’ll leave that at that”.
Meanwhile independent Senator Gerard Craughwell says political parties should foot the bill for ministerial advisors.
