We return to today's list. I call Deputy Murnane O'Connor.

Community employment, CE, supervisors remain without pension entitlements. This is a long-running issue that has not been addressed. I have been contacted regularly by a number of CE supervisors in my constituency of Carlow-Kilkenny who feel very left behind. Why, after more than ten years, do they remain without a pension? A deep sense of frustration is felt by the CE supervisors and assistant supervisors in their efforts to secure an occupational pension. The State hires these supervisors and, to all intents and purposes, employs them. We need this issue to be sorted once and for all.

Promises were made but two judgements are being ignored - one historic and one recent. The first is the 2008 Labour Court recommendation that the funding agency was a statutory body of the Government and had responsibility for the CE supervisors' pensions, and, more recently, a report by the Workplace Relations Commission, WRC, which indicates a responsibility on the State's part to provide a pension. This judgement is available on the WRC website. There are talks going on and we should have a solution.

The Deputy has her point made, she has used her time.

This is a long-running issue and sore. It ongoing for 15 years by now. I would also love to see a resolution. It is the case that CE supervisors are entitled to the State contributory pension, as everyone else is, but they are not entitled to a public service pension. The reason for that is, first, they are not public servants, they are not employees of the State even though the body that employs them is funded by the State and, second, they have not been paying a public sector pension contribution throughout their working life, as every public servant does. If we start giving public service pensions to people who are not public servants and have not been paying a percentage of their salary into their public service pension, there will be no end to that and that is not something that any Government can concede. If we can find some solution another way, we would be happy to do so and we want to do so.

We are on the verge of resolving a long-standing issue around school secretaries and caretakers, and this is another that we would really like to see resolved, but it can only be resolved in that context. We cannot get into a situation whereby we give public sector pensions to people who are not public servants and did not pay a public service contribution all their lives.