I thank Senator McDowell for his amendment. I do not propose to accept it because a consequence of this amendment would be further delay to this transformational societal initiative. This has been flagged for nearly 30 years and implementation is well overdue. I believe it is in the best interests of future automatic enrolment, AE, participants to have the scheme up and running as soon as possible. We have discussed it a lot, considered it and designed it. It is time now to just get on with it. Somebody always has …

I agree with Senators Burke and Ardagh. There are many people, as we speak, waiting for this system to get up and running, especially the 800,000 people who do not have any private pension cover apart from the State pension. That is particularly low-paid workers and women. As I said, it is important we move on as quickly as we can. Contracts are already in place and we will be signing up to them in a very short time. The process is moving on and I cannot afford to stall it. For that reason, I do not propose that we…

Senators will notice that I am bringing forward several dozen Government amendments today. The key point I would make about the Government amendments is that without exception they are all of a technical nature and do not in any way relate to new or changed policy. This is the first point that applies to every amendment I will propose today. The second point is that the vast majority of the amendments have been proposed by the drafters in the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel who, having had some time since the p…

I thank the Senator for bringing forward these amendments. Unfortunately, I do not propose to accept them. On the amendment in respect of a report on a universal pension, this issue does not come within the scope of the Bill. The national automatic enrolment retirement savings authority, NAERSA, will have no remit to consider such a proposal. In any event, a report is not necessary because this matter was considered and reported on by the Commission on Pensions as recently as 2021. The commission concluded that the…

I believe that automatic enrolment will address the pension gap. I believe it will make a significant difference. A total of 800,000 people who do not have provision other than the State pension will now have a pension for their retirement. The Senator discussed the issue around tax relief at length. Tax relief is a tax policy matter and is not for this Bill.

I do not propose to accept these amendments. Amendment No. 7 would prevent the authority from arranging for the investment of contributions with procured commercial investment management providers. Part 4 of the Bill provides considerable detail about how the new authority will engage with external investment management providers with a range of appropriate safeguards to ensure that participants' funds are protected and are invested well. It is not feasible that the new authority would not contract with commercial …

I thank the Senators for bringing forward these amendments. I do not propose to accept them. The membership of the board of the National Automatic Enrolment Retirement Savings Authority, NAERSA, is not constituted on the basis of sectoral representation. Instead, it is based on what that person has to offer to the authority, and that is their skill set and experience. One of the Senators mentioned gender balance. My record in ensuring there is a gender balance on State boards is there for all to see. I always, wher…

Once money is given to a person, it is his or her money. It is in his or her pot. It is that person's pension pot. The money is a top-up for that person, so it becomes his or her property. That is what I mean when I say this is not State investment. This is for the members of the scheme. It is their money. It is not State money. That is why I said that.

You are misrepresenting me.

No, the Senator is misrepresenting me.

I am pleased to give my support to Ireland opting into the EU migration and asylum pact. We can all agree on the immense value that people coming here to work, live or study bring to Ireland economically, socially and culturally. The importance of the international protection process for those fleeing persecution and Ireland's duty to provide shelter for those most vulnerable also need to be recognised. However, for an immigration and asylum system to be efficient and effective, it is critical that it should be fir…

To be very clear here, and I have already said this, there are loads of provisions in the Bill to take account of the ESG. The State's obligations with regard to relevant international agreements would include the sustainable finance disclosure regulation, the UN Global Compact and the Paris Agreement, which guide the international community on matters such as carbon emissions and investment in unethical assets. In respect of these moneys, once the employer pays in, the employee pays in and the State tops it up, it…

All ESG matters are fully and comprehensively addressed in the Bill.

I thank the Senator for bringing these forward. The Bill already sets out in section 40 that the authority will provide a comprehensive and detailed annual report. As is the nature of these things, all financial matters, including what is envisaged by the Senator, will be covered, so no amendment is needed. As for the other two amendments, one of them cannot be accepted because any procurements conducted by NAERSA would already be governed by procurement law. It is not appropriate to set down further restrictions o…

I cannot accept any of these amendments. I want to say very clearly that this is not public money. Once it is given, it becomes the private property of the individual. I need to emphasise that NAERSA will not be administering a new State fund but, rather, will be administering hundreds of thousands of individual savings accounts that are and will remain the personal property of the automatic enrolment participant. The automatic enrolment project, in that sense, is a State-incentivised personal retirement saving sch…

I will say this again because I do not think it was understood the first time. Investment decisions will be the responsibility of the investment managers operating under a services contract with NAERSA. The investment strategy is set out in the Bill in quite some detail and NAERSA, in negotiating contracts with investment managers, will apply those statutory requirements. ESG arrangements are further provided for in section 74, which sets out the investment rules that will be applicable to contracted service provid…

That is not what I said.

I thank the Senator. The purpose of NAERSA is to manage all of this and to act in the interests of the participants or the members of the scheme. The objective is that it will be self-financing, but to set it up in the initial years, we need to give it powers to borrow because it takes a while for this to ramp up. That is why we are allowing it those powers.

I thank the Senator for bringing these amendments forward. I point out that NAERSA will not be established as a research institute. Ireland already has a number of world-class institutes and universities with the ability to undertake a detailed analysis of automatic enrolment and its participants in due course. I do not intend to overburden NAERSA with unnecessary matters. The Bill already provides for annual reviews and a comprehensive review of how the system is working within five years of its operation, and tha…

People can join the auto-enrolment scheme at any age but not after the age of 66. If someone is late coming into the scheme there are arrangements so he or she can access the scheme. If someone was joining the auto-enrolment scheme at the age of 60 it would be to his or her benefit because he or she would have a savings pot by the time of retirement because when the employer contributions and the State top-up are applied it is of benefit to join the system