Top civil servant Robert Watt will not benefit from terms of new public pay deal

Top civil servant Robert Watt will not benefit from the terms of a new public pay deal agreed this week, pending a review of how high-level officials are appointed.

Ministers were told in a private briefing at Cabinet on Wednesday that if the pay deal comes into effect it would not increase the salary of “a serving secretary general in the Civil Service to a salary rate above the current highest rate that applies to a secretary general post (ie €297,869)”.

Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly confirmed earlier this year that Mr Watt’s salary, which has been the subject of controversy since he was given an €81,000 pay hike when moving to the post of secretary general of the Department of Health, is now €297,869.

The Cabinet was told that the agreement will not increase the salary due to an ongoing review into recruitment and pay determination processes for senior public service posts, commissioned by Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Michael McGrath in March of this year.

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An independent panel is reviewing the processes and is set to make recommendations to ensure the processes in place are open, transparent and objective, Ministers were told.

“In light of this ongoing work, and pending any changes introduced on foot of the final recommendations . . . the application of the agreement shall not have the effect of increasing the salary of a serving secretary general in the Civil Service to a salary rate above the current highest rate that applies to a secretary general post (ie €297,869),” Cabinet was told.

The Department of Public Expenditure and Reform (DPER), which is responsible for public pay, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday night, seeking clarification on whether any other public servants on an equivalent or higher salary would benefit from the deal.

The Department of Health earlier this week referred queries from The Irish Times on Mr Watt’s salary to DPER. The HSE did not respond to whether its new chief executive will benefit from an increased salary under the deal.

Secretaries general will not be getting the top-ups that had been due to them under the original Building Momentum deal this October as their pay was increased in July as part of the pay restoration deal to unwind recession-era emergency pay cuts for public servants. Mr Watt did not benefit from the pay restoration as he and other top-earning public servants didn’t qualify because their salaries were set after the cuts.

The secretaries general will also not get the 3 per cent backdated increases due this year under the proposed new pay deal due to the restoration of the old cuts. However, most of them will get 3.5 per cent increases next year, if the deal is agreed.