Taxpayer foots bill for 2,300 appointees to state agencies [tribune.ie]
- Published: 04 July 2010
TAXPAYERS are funding over 2,300 people serving on the boards of state agencies and most of them are political appointees, a new report on non-commercial state agencies has revealed.
Health minister Mary Harney has had 397 board members appointed to the 31 agencies under her remit, the report by Muiris Mac Carthaigh of the Institute of Public Administration (IPA) says.
With annual fees of around €14,000 a year paid to each person appointed to a state board, the total cost to the taxpayer for board members alone, comes to over €32m a year.
This does not include the estimated 12,500 employees in state agencies costing around €600m a year.
Mac Carthaigh makes no mention of fees, but suggests that the average number of board members be cut down from 12 to nine or even six, based on state boards in Australia.
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