FÁS pension scandal - Another fine mess Minister

LAST year several high-ranking public employees were afforded the sanctuary offered by early retirement.

Some retired because they were found to be incompetent, others because they abused their position. The great majority left for no reason other than they could.

Former FÁS boss Rody Molloy resigned because he shamefully exploited that agency’s expenses regime.

This week the Comptroller & Auditor General reported that Mr Molloy’s get-him-out-of-here package was worth €892,269 more than what a comparable public servant taking early retirement would get.

We should remind ourselves that he had no option but to resign and that his package was endorsed by Tánaiste Mary Coughlan.

She, unbelievably, defended her role in this deepening farce again yesterday. Saying she had acted on “advice” she promised the CAG’s report would be forwarded to the Attorney General to see if the Mr Molloy’s bonanza package could be “unpicked”.

This off-the-designer-cuff but contradictory response represents the governance of the outraged by the utterly bewildered. In so many of these instances ministers have hidden behind “procedures”. What has been done to change these suspect arrangements so incompetents or serial abusers of expense accounts might face censure rather than get gold-plated retirement packages?

You guessed it, nothing.