Category: FOIs

Department of Foreign Affairs expenses data

Some time ago I sought from the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA):

1) A datadump (or copy) of the entire Sun database insofar as such data relates to claimed expenses.

The Department has released the data in question. Unfortunately it was released in PDF format (3,000+ pages), so it will take a little extra time to import into spreadsheets. The release contains three tranches, expenses of DFA staff (2005 to 2010), Irish Aid expense claims (2005 to 2010), and Honorary Consul expense claims. I will be publishing this data over the coming weeks.

For now here are the Honorary Consul claims, which are relatively minor. I again wish to emphasise that publishing this data is not an attempt to embarrass any one person, nor does it form the basis of any claim that somehow there was something unjustified about any expense claimed by civil servants. It is merely an attempt to publish large public datasets as an exercise in transparency.

Other database requests are also pending, or subject to appeals.

Honorary Consul expenses 2005 to 2010

The data is subject to correction (albeit minor) because of the OCR processes I have to run on PDFs. However these will be checked once they are complete.

Anglo emails

I received a bunch of emails today from the Department of Finance in relation to communications with Anglo Irish Bank between September 2008 and February 2009. I will scan them all shortly and upload. One in particular though caught my eye. It’s an email exchange between Marie Mulvihill at the DoF and John Paul Coleman at Anglo Irish Bank. It’s dated February 2, 2009, just two weeks after nationalisation, subject line: “Query over Tier 2 capital”.

John Paul

We have received a query regarding the tier 2 capital securities on Anglo Irish Bank’s balance sheet. I’ve had a quick look at the preliminary results as at 30th September 2008 but can’t locate a break down.

I would be grateful if you could outline what makes up the Tier 2 capital and whether it is covered by the Bank Guarantee Scheme.

Many Thanks

Marie

About an hour later, John Paul emailed back, stating:

Marie,

With Tier 2 capital the Bank has two forms of securities issued these are Lower Tier II (LT2) and Upper Tier II.

LT2 the Bank has issued all have a final maturity date and therefore fall into the dated subordinated category’ which is covered by the Bank guarantee scheme. The coupons on LT2 cannot be deferred and most be paid at each coupon date

The Bank has 5 LT2 deals outstanding these are
€750 million Floating Rate Subordinated Notes 2014
US$.165 million Subordinated Notes Series A 2015
US$ 35 million Subordinated Notes Series B 2017
€500 million Floating Rate Subordinated Notes 2016
€750 million Floating Rate Subordinated Notes 2017

In total the Bank has €2,112 million outstanding at 30t h September 2008 of LT2 Upper Tier II that the Bank has issued is perpetual bonds i.e. they do not have a final maturity date.

Unlike LT2 the coupons on Upper Tier II can be deferred but are cumulative i.e. if you miss one coupon payment at the next coupon payment date you most pay the two coupons. Upper Tier II is not covered under the Bank Guarantee Scheme as it is perpetual

The Bank has one Upper Tier 2 GBP300miilion with a value of €385milIion at the 30th September 2008.

If you need any additional information please let me know.

Regards
John-Paul

The question I am asking myself is why, two weeks after nationalisation, the Department of Finance was only then asking about Tier 2 Capital? Interestingly, Carl O’Brien at the Irish Times sought the briefing papers used by DoF officials at a recent Oireachtas committee. The DoF is keen to defend itself it would appear.

Original document here:

DOF/Anglo email

Department of Justice reference book

All public bodies are obliged to publish Section 15 and Section 16 reference books every three years under the FOI Act. The Department of Justice website says:

The reference books are available for inspection in public libraries, Garda stations, court offices and all offices of the Department.

Great. No sign of the actual reference book though.

So I now give you: the Department of Justice reference book, available exclusively on thestory.ie, after some deep searching on Google. It makes for very very interesting reading. After reading through it, you might see why the document was deliberately not placed on the Department of Justice website. I should say I have used this reference book for at least two FOI requests that I have yet to write about.



Department of Finance FOI logs 2007 to March 2010

Some time ago I sought the FOI requests of the Department of Finance for the period January 2007 to March 2010. This has been issued (in paper format and then scanned). I have published the logs in both PDF and Google Spreadsheets. The logs give an insight into what was being sought (mainly by journalists) over the entire period of the financial crisis. Any redactions are Section 28 (Personal information).

Finance request logs 2007 to 2010 (Google Spreadsheet)

Department of Finance FOI log 2007 to 2010

Seanad salary and expenses 2005 to 2008

Following on from the publication of spreadsheets containing the salaries and expenses of TDs for the 2005, 2006, 2007 to 2008, we have now put together the same for the Seanad. For the period 2005 to 2008, the Oireachtas paid out €27,177,074.19 to Senators in salaries and expenses. Here are the top 20:

Paddy Burke € 642,281.37 (Leas Chathaoirleach 2002 to present)
Pat Moylan € 545,678.73 (Cathaoirleach 2007 to present)
Terry Leyden € 523,282.73 (Address listed as Leinster House, from Roscommon)
Geraldine Feeney € 504,558.08 (Sligo)
Camillus Glynn € 502,320.99 (Westmeath)
Maurice Cummins € 501,932.80 (Waterford)
Peter Callanan € 499,885.39 (Deceased, Cork)
Michael McCarthy € 498,351.77 (Cork)
Jim Walsh € 495,986.50 (Wexford)
Paul Bradford € 494,638.65 (Cork)
Francis O’Brien € 481,749.97 (Monaghan)
Rory Kiely € 478,552.18 (Cathaoirleach of the Seanad 2002 to 2007)
Labhras O Murchu € 478,009.16 (Tipperary)
Kieran Phelan € 474,963.74 (Deceased, Laois)
Diarmuid Wilson € 473,503.87 (Cavan)
Marc MacSharry € 472,206.44 (Sligo)
John Hanafin € 469,543.68 (Tipperary)
John Paul Phelan € 442,869.87 (Kilkenny)
Joe O’Toole € 433,713.64 (Dublin)
Ann Ormonde € 427,125.03 (Dublin)

The bottom 20 were:

Dan Boyle € 167,345.79
Pearse Doherty € 165,081.70
Larry Butler € 163,652.26
Mark Daly € 160,073.02
Frances Fitzgerald € 158,008.48
Alan Kelly € 157,395.10
Dominic Hannigan € 155,628.24
Lisa McDonald € 153,411.96
Ciaran Cannon € 143,535.51
Martin Brady € 142,440.28
Paul CoghIan € 136,794.64
Paschal Donohoe € 134,109.64
Eoghan Harris € 130,529.61
Maria Corrigan € 129,868.17
Deirdre De Burca € 125,795.49
Ivana Bacik € 125,338.78
Ronan Mullen € 125,278.90
Alex White € 125,107.31
Eugene Regan € 125,053.96
Fiona O Malley € 123,798.70

Full pivot table here: Senator totals 2005 to 2008

Again it is worth noting that the period 2005 to 2008 includes an election in 2007, so not all Senators would have been in their seats for the entire period. It is also again worth noting that the Cathlaoirleach and Leas Chathlaoirleach earn higher amounts due to their positions (allowances received due to position). And again we must emphasise: these amounts only cover salary and expenses, they do not cover costs incurred by Members, for such things as inter-parliamentary association travel.

Here are the total spreadsheets broken down by year:

Senate 2005 (xls)

Senate 2006 (xls)

Senate 2007 (xls)

Senate 2008 (xls)

TD expenses 2005 to 2008

We were pleased to see the announcement from the Oireachtas that from yesterday, expense claims of the Members will be published on a monthly basis. It’s a step in the right direction, and important for greater public scrutiny of the administration of the State.

Unfortunately the information is published in PDFs and contain little contextual information. Open formats and more data would have been better.

For our own part, we have been seeking for the past eight months all historical data on the expense claims of Members, from 1998 to 2009. We have made some progress. In tandem with the Oireachtas releasing its figures, we are provisionally publishing the spreadsheets of all expenses and salaries for members for the period 2005 to 2008. It is however important to point out that expenses do not cover the full cost of Members to the public purse – travel costs for example are largely paid by the Oireachtas itself and are not part of the expenses regime. We believe these costs should also be published, and probably combined with expense claims, so we have a full picture. (These figures exclude Ministerial salaries and expenses)

Some figures:

From 2005 to 2008, €97,637,195.65 was paid out to TDs in salaries and expenses.

The top 30 for the period are (a proviso: the Ceann Comhairle and his deputy receive Ministerial-like salaries, and heads of Committees receive greater amounts)

Rory O’Hanlon € 789,543.77
Michael Moynihan € 726,873.65
Bernard Allen € 725,636.56
Noel O’Flynn € 723,782.51
Sean Fleming € 722,561.57
Johnny Brady € 720,676.88
Jackie Healy-Rae € 719,350.52
Dan Neville € 712,660.55
Brendan Howlin € 709,654.03
John Cregan € 704,570.69
Padraic McCormack € 699,120.51
Ned O’Keeffe € 695,606.45
Dinny McGinley € 692,391.64
Seymour Crawford € 692,011.42
John Perry € 691,415.49
Michael Lowry € 690,947.20
Tom Hayes € 690,436.23
Peter Kelly € 684,358.22
Paul Kehoe € 680,046.39
Michael Ring € 679,042.87
Enda Kenny € 676,745.95
John O’Donoghue € 675,828.78
Phil Hogan € 672,263.48
Niall Blaney € 671,759.13
Pat Breen € 669,201.01
Jim O’Keeffe € 668,538.10
Michael Finneran € 665,965.04
John Moloney € 663,295.21
Beverley Flynn € 661,031.29
John Deasy € 659,961.01

Here is a full breakdown by member

Below is the full representation by year, including committee membership and all other expense headings. Some curious figures arise. For example:

In 2007 the biggest overall recipient of salary plus expenses was Deputy Michael Lowry. He received €194,643.02 and did not head any committees. This was the highest of any Member in the Dail, including the Ceann Comhairle (John O’Donoghue at the time) who received a Ministerial style salary (earning €189,120.56, or about €5,000 less than Mr Lowry). The main reason I can see as to why Mr Lowry stands out is his travel expenses: €70,169.08 in one year, the highest of any member, and a good €15,000 more than the next highest recipient (Michael Ring).

I am sure there are lots of other curious stats in the spreadsheets, have a look. You might see slight misspelling of names (thanks to OCR processes), but all of the figures have been triple checked against records released under the FOI Act.

2008 TD (xls)

2007 TD (xls)

2006 TD (xls)

2005 TD (xls)

I will shortly publish the same set of figures for the Seanad.

Taoiseach briefing papers 1998

As part of our look at Cabinet papers now available under Section 19 (3) (b) of the FOI Act, I sought some briefing papers for the Taoiseach for Cabinet meetings in April and May 1998. Some of the redactions refer directly to the Constitutional protection of Cabinet “discussion”. I will publish the schedule of redactions shortly. My favourite bits:

In the briefing papers for April 28, 1998, in reference to the plans for LUAS:

We are anxious to avoid discussion by Government of the proposal in the presence of the consultants lest it lead to a public perception that the consultants are driving the decision process.

Or discussion of the Copyright Amendment Bill:

The matter is urgent because it is an essential part of an arrangement between the Department of Enterprise Trade & Employment and the U.S. Trade Authorities, the object of which was to persuade the U.S. Authorities not to proceed with an infringement action against Ireland in the World Trade Organisation.

In briefing papers for May 12, 1998, in reference to proposed ESB price increases:

Despite the good performance, the ESB still wish to implement the third phase of a price increase which was part of the CCR agreement accepted by the previous Government. The Department are of the view that this is not warranted as it was based on projected profits of £31 m in 1998. Profits will be at least £160m this year without a price increase.

The set of released documents is here: