Show us the money — but not the receipts

What Mr Dignam (Letters Irish Examiner, February 9) from the Oireachtas Head of Communications, chose not to mention in his defence of the Oireachtas gravy train, is that the Oireachtas doesn’t publish one receipt to verify that any of the expenses paid to members are reflective of genuine expenses incurred.

For example, accommodation allowances are paid to long term members. Who checks if those members still actually incur those costs? Are Enda Kenny, Micheál Martin, Michael Noonan, or Brendan Howlin still paying mortgages on Dublin homes.

What too if TDs are renting from family members? Then there are the expenses and allowances for local offices but with zero oversight about who owns these offices.

So not only does the taxpayer buy and pay for a TD’s Dublin home, they also buy and pay for their local office and the TD is free to build up a property empire.

What about the daily attendance allowance paid to members of the Oireachtas, which is in addition to their lavish salary, and is paid just for turning up? Is it too much to think Leinster House workers should pay for their own lunch and travel to work costs like everyone else?

Let’s not forget those ethical independent TDs who also claim maximum expenses but has any one of them ever published a receipt?

The Oireachtas is one of the few parliaments in a mature democracy that doesn’t publish receipts. It doesn’t even meet the standards of transparency that applied in other parliaments in the 1970s and it is now 2016.

Desmond FitzGerald

Canary Wharf

London

England