Housing tsar to be paid ‘mad-cap’ salary to ‘job share’ with minister, Dáil told

By Gráinne Ní Aodha, PA

The creation of a senior housing role who is paid a “gold-plated” salary is “a daft idea”, a Sinn Féin TD has said.

The housing delivery unit is being created to tackle “silos” in increasing the supply of homes, but the government had made no decision on personnel or their salaries, the Tánaiste said.

The Government is expected to appoint the chief executive of the National Asset Management Agency (Nama), Brendan McDonagh, to lead the new unit.

It has been reported in recent weeks that he could be seconded into the role and retain his Nama salary of around €430,000.

This has put pressure on the Government over its housing strategy, particularly from the opposition who questioned the high salary.

Sinn Féin TD Pearse Doherty said it was “embarrassing” that the Government was prepared to pay someone €500,000 to take on the Housing Minister’s duties.

“€430,000, that’s the off-the-wall salary that your Government is planning to pay the new housing tsar to come in and basically job share with the Housing Minister James Browne,” Mr Doherty said during Leaders’ Questions on Thursday.

He said Mr Browne himself had described the role of “the housing tsar” as being responsible for rapid responses and “unlocking” housing delivery with the help of experts.

“Tánaiste, does the Housing Minister not realise that that’s his job that he’s describing? That’s his actual job. It’s farcical stuff.”

He told the Dáil that claims that the “mad-cap”, “gold-plated” salary would not cost additional public funds as Mr McDonagh is being seconded from Nama “appears not to be true”.

He said that as Nama is due to be wound down this year, Mr McDonagh is due to return to the NTMA, where he was seconded from, “at a significantly reduced salary”.

Tánaiste and Fine Gael minister Simon Harris said one of the key issues with housing construction was “silos” between sectors.

The Cabinet sub-committee on housing is due to meet on Thursday and a new housing plan is due by the summer recess, Mr Harris said.

He said the Housing Commission said that a Housing Delivery Oversight Executive was “essential to address the systemic reset required” in the housing sector.

The Commission’s report said this body would “be legislatively empowered to remove obstacles to housing delivery and would drive coordination across legislation, regulation, and istrative practices”.

Mr Harris also said he was “surprised” at Sinn Féin’s opposition to the suggestion because its election manifesto proposed an office that would do “exactly what we now want to do”.

Mr Doherty interrupted to say “no housing tsar” to which Mr Harris said “there’s no housing tsar for us either”, which prompted laughter from the Sinn Féin benches.

“We haven’t made any decisions in relation to personnel or pay. No decisions at all, and let me say this – process matters in relation to all of those issues.

“The overriding objective won’t be personality. The overriding objective will be getting the job done.”

Mr Doherty said “who are you trying to fool” by claiming there is “no housing tsar in our plan”.

“The idea that you’re blindsided in relation to this is just nonsense. Yous are proposing a housing tsar, yous are proposing a salary of €430,000. That’s what was on the table, on the cards here.”

Mr Harris replied that the housing minister brought forward a proposal to the cabinet begin setting up an office “to break down silos in relation to housing.

“The only decision the Government of Ireland took this week was in relation to that.

“Now that the Government of Ireland has done that, we will now decide how best to populate the office, process matters, I want to understand the processes followed in relation to key personnel, and then we will address all of those matters and put this together.

“Of course, people who do a job will be paid a salary, but this isn’t about personalities.”

Labour leader Ivana Bacik called the role a “housing tsar with a Russian oligarch price tag” and “a fixer in chief”.

“It’s interesting to hear you and Fine Gael colleagues distancing yourselves from this, and indeed, I think people will be glad to hear that you’ve just said no decision has been made yet on how to populate this new office,” she said.