Seán Ó Fearghaíl says he is disappointed at level of attendance as fundamentally important auto-enrolment pension legislation approved
Ms Humphreys brought 88 amendments that the Seanad had made to the Automatic Enrolment Retirement Savings System Bill, legislation the Minister said had taken “nearly 30 years to get this far”. However, he said “it is very disappointing that we are speaking to a chamber that is largely empty and one wonders why there aren’t more members present for something that is of such fundamental importance”.
It was estimated last year that 32 per cent of workers aged between 20 and 60 had no pension scheme in place, with almost a quarter of 45-54-year-olds in the same position, meaning hundreds of thousands of people would potentially be entirely dependent on the State pension.