Michael D'Arcy says €500k banking pay cap should be retained
Junior Finance Minister Michael D'Arcy has insisted the €500,000 annual banking pay cap should be retained, despite increasing pressure from institutions to relax the rules.
The cap has been in place since the State took control, either partly or entirely, of six banks a decade ago.
Mr D'Arcy's boss Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe is currently considering whether the cap should be lifted and whether bonuses should be allowed again.
Mr Donohoe received a report by headhunters Korn Ferry on the issue but has not yet made a decision on whether to lift the caps.
But speaking in New York to the Financial Times, Mr D'Arcy said he felt the caps are appropriate.
“The senior executives are on very large salaries and as long as the state owns [their banks], I’m satisfied the pay caps are appropriate,” Michael D’Arcy told the Financial Times in an interview in New York, describing bankers’ pay as “the very very top percentile of salaries in Ireland”.
We have come through a pretty difficult decade — banking bonuses, as you know prior to the previous collapse, they were not a helpful factor.
Mr D’Arcy also ruled out any further sale of the government’s stakes in AIB and Bank of Ireland before the UK leaves the European Union on October 31.
The government currently owns 76pc of AIB, having sold 25% of it stake in the bank in 2017 and 14pc of Bank of Ireland.
A push to end bankers pay restrictions here has been led by AIB, which has complained it is losing talent to financial institutions and tech firms not bound by pay caps.
