More than 150 staff at airport operator Daa earned over €150,000 last year
A total of 152 staff at the State-owned airport operator
Daa
earned above €150,000 each last year, figures show.
Official figures also reveal the chief executive at the group, which runs Dublin and Cork airports and other subsidiaries, is not the organisation's highest-paid staff member in 2024.
Last year one unnamed person had total remuneration of between €475,000 and €500,000. The company's chief executive Kenny Jacobs received a total package of €374,830.
In a statement, Daa said it was a commercial business that received no public funding. It said it had to compete internationally for key personnel.
READ MORE
Eamon Ryan
, then minister for transport, set out remuneration levels for the top earners at Daa in an appendix to a submission sent last summer to a government-appointed pay review for chief executives of commercial state companies.
Mr Ryan's submission, which has been released by the
Department of Transport
, were based on figures for 2023.
Those figures showed three staff were paid more than the chief executive, who that year received total remuneration of €347,457. The three were paid between €350,000 and €375,000.
The document showed 137 personnel received total remuneration of more than €150,000 each in 2023.
Mr Ryan's submission to the senior posts remuneration committee said that 3,864 personnel at Daa group earned less than €50,000, although this included part-time staff.
He said remuneration for CEOs varied across international competitors in the aviation sector.
Mr Ryan noted the head of Fraport, which runs Frankfurt Airport and has contracts at 30 others worldwide, had a total package of €1.65 million while the head of Aena, the state company that manages 46 airports in Spain, was paid €186,575 in 2023.
Daa's annual report for 2024 showed 152 people received €150,000 or more last year.
In addition, 88 employees were paid between €125,000 and €150,000, while 187 earned between €100,000 and €125,000.
The company said: 'The State does not fund the remuneration of Daa staff, as Daa operates as a commercial business and receives no public funding.
'Aviation is a global industry and Daa competes for talent against other international airports and aviation businesses, as well as international retailers.
'Daa is a multinational commercial enterprise with operations in 14 countries across four continents, with several CEOs and management teams.'
The annual report said Mr Jacobs received total remuneration of €374,830 last year – up from €347,457 the previous year. It said this figure included basic salary of €284,235 and pension contributions and other taxable benefits of €90,595 . It said Mr Jacobs did not receive a director's fee.
Last month the Cabinet accepted many of the recommendations of the senior post remuneration committee.
Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers said the upper limit on any proposed package would be the market rate .
However, there would be no backdating of any increases to May 1st of last year, another committee recommendation, and no reintroduction of performance-related bonuses worth up to 25 per cent of salaries, which was also proposed.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Irish Times
3 hours ago
- Irish Times
Only the introduction of Tina's maiden name could stir a response from ‘monster' Richard Satchwell
'My name is Sarah Howard. I am Tina Dingivan's niece.' Richard Satchwell , the man about to be sentenced to life for Tina's murder, moved his head up, ever so slightly, when her name was spoken. Throughout the trial, the woman he killed, his wife, was referred to as Tina Satchwell. His name. Sarah finished reading her victim impact statement. READ MORE If it made any impact, he certainly didn't show it. He never once looked at her. But she made sure to look at him as she passed by the dock, an expression of disgust on her face. Next up. 'My name is Lorraine Howard. I am Tina Dingivan's sister.' Again, just a tiny movement of the head at the mention of that name. Lorraine finished reading her victim impact statement. Satchwell, motionless, eyes cast down, ignored her too. It was only the pointed use of Tina's family name which seemed to stir some flickers of awareness. Lorraine Howard said Richard Satchwell 'stole' precious time she would have had with her sister, Tina (pictured). Photograph: Irish Examiner Both women called him out for the cruel, manipulative 'monster' he really is. They described how he continued to torture them with public outpourings of his love for his 'missing' wife after he killed her and hid the body. They told him how his need to have 'ultimate control' over Tina led to her violent death and a lifetime of pain for her grieving family. Sarah and Lorraine may as well have been talking to the wall. Minutes later, Satchwell's lawyer would confirm to the court that he intends to appeal his conviction. He believes he didn't murder Tina. A jury of his peers agreed unanimously that he did. He couldn't control them. And what Tina's sister and niece did from the witness stand in court number six on Wednesday was something he can never control either – they gave her back her name, the one she had before she met him, reintroducing the woman they knew before his malign influence infested her life. He believes he didn't murder his wife, Tina Satchwell. She belonged to him. He loves her. But, as the court case revealed, and her sister and niece confirmed, he couldn't allow a life for Tina Dingivan. When her maiden name was so deliberately introduced – no mention of his, it was a simple, but very powerful gesture by her family. Richard Satchwell holding a photo of his missing wife Tina at their home in Youghal, Co Cork. Photograph: Irish Examiner And perhaps, with those slight flickers of recognition, Richard Satchwell knows that too. There was little surprise in court when Judge Paul McDermott was told that the English-born, Cork-based lorry driver intends to fight on. He thinks he should not have been found guilty of murdering his wife and dumping her body in a chest freezer before entombing her in a concrete grave under the stairs in their home and then contacting her niece to offer her the empty freezer. Always thinking of others. Gardaí and Fr Bill Bermingham after human remains are found following the search of Richatd and Tina Satchwell's home in Youghal, Co Cork. Photograph: Michael Mac Sweeney/Provision 'To think I could have taken that into my family home and used it. I mean, what kind of person can do that?' said Sarah, in disbelief. But the theatrically loving husband believes he should not be sent down for life because 'he never intended to kill her', said defence counsel Brendan Grehan, acting under instruction from his client. Furthermore, counsel said, Satchwell wanted it to be known that 'despite anything that was said in this trial, Tina was a lovely person'. You could hear people catch their breath in the back rows, where Tina's family and friends were seated. Satchwell's self-centred delusion still had the capacity to surprise after a five week trial. 'It's not right,' a woman in the public gallery loudly whispered as the court rose and the prisoner quickly exited, head down, looking at nobody. Despite feeling so strongly about the nature of his conviction, and being so keen to underline how he wanted people to know that 'Tina was a lovely person' (after lying about her being violent towards him and running off with their life's savings), he made no reaction when his barrister delivered his message for him. But despite all which was said during the trial, Richard wanted to seem nice in public about the 'lovely' woman he murdered. Self-serving until the very end. The details of the case have been well aired. It's the stuff of true crime TV potboilers. But the callous nature of Satchwell's cover-up and his co-option of Tina's grieving family into his sickening narrative of a heartbroken husband desperate for the return of his missing wife was laid bare by the emotional testimony of Sarah and Lorraine. Mary Collins, the mother of Tina Dingivin. Photograph: Collins Courts As Tina's mother Mary Collins listened from the body of the court, Lorraine said Satchwell 'stole' the precious time she would have had with her sister, time he also stole from others 'even before he murdered her by isolating and alienating her from her many friends when she was alive'. How could anyone who claimed to love his wife so much do what he did? 'I feel no sentence could ever be enough for the monster who took Tina from us.' What does a monster look like? A monster looks like a nondescript bespectacled little man in a rumpled over-sized blue and white striped shirt which hangs out over his navy trousers. He silently sits with his stubbled jaw resting on his fist, body angled away from the public and the witness box, head down. When told to stand for sentencing, he sticks his hands in his pockets and looks vacantly into the distance. Cowardly, controlling Richard Satchwell murdered his wife. Tina Dingivan's name lives on.
Irish Times
4 hours ago
- Irish Times
Death row survivor Sonia ‘Sunny' Jacobs found ‘tranquility' in Connemara before death in house fire
Sonia 'Sunny' Jacobs and her husband Peter Pringle lived out their lives in a place of breathtaking beauty and isolation. Each morning when they opened their curtains they had views of the blue-tinged Twelve Pins mountain range , rocky bogland and Lough Glenicmurrin. The 1970s-era bungalow where Ms Jacobs (76) and her caretaker Kevin Kelly (31) died in a house fire in the early hours of Tuesday morning is down a rough boreen. The area is now closed off with Garda tape. It seems scarcely believable that a woman who overcame so much in her life would succumb to the tragedy of a house fire along with a young man who had his whole life ahead of him. READ MORE [ Woman who died in Connemara house fire named as former US death row inmate Sunny Jacobs Opens in new window ] Sonny Jacobs pictured at the Cuirt International Festival of Literature in 2007. Photograph: Joe O'Shaughnessy. Ms Jacobs spent five years on death row in Florida and 16 years in prison for a murder she did not commit. While she was in prison, her parents, who were looking after her two children, were killed in a plane crash. She was released in 1992. Six years later, at a meeting organised by Amnesty International in Galway, she met Peter Pringle. He had also been on death row in Ireland for the murder of gardaí John Morley and Henry Byrne in July 1980. He too was exonerated having spent 14 years in jail. They moved twice in Connemara before settling in Glenicmurrin at the end of a row of about a dozen houses. The nearest town, Costelloe, is 15 minutes drive away. Despite their isolation, they regularly received visitors mostly in connection with the Sunny Centre, which she set up with Mr Pringle to campaign against the death penalty worldwide. Mr Pringle died in December 2023 and Ms Jacobs's beloved dog, Barney, died a short time after that. Postman Michael Leainde got to know the couple better than most. 'People are really shocked and it is only now they are coming to grips with what happened,' he said. 'She was very witty. I'd be talking to her every second day. If I said something and she didn't think it was right, she would say, 'Michael, you were wrong about that'. She was a great woman and we had great chats,' he said. Postman Michael Leainde got to know the couple better than most. Photograph: Ronan McGreevy He thought she and her husband found a happiness in the landscape of Connemara that had denied to them for so long in their lives. 'If you look around you, you have peace and tranquillity. When you get a little bit older in age, you want to have some peace in life. They really appreciated what they had here,' she said. Mr Leainde, who is also a local councillor, spoke to her last Thursday and said she was in great form. She had spoken to her son recently via video call, he recalled. A neighbour, Michael Walsh, said he knew her husband Mr Pringle very well and he would call in occasionally. They were a happy couple who moved to the location in their final years to the house their final location locally having rented an adjacent house for many years. She was a 'nice woman. We all felt sorry for her for all the years she spent in prison', he said. Ruairí McKiernan, a former member of the Council of State, a body that advises the president of Ireland, first met Ms Jacobs 18 years ago and they became good friends. Despite being 76, she worked until the end of her life talking, podcasting and advocating for the Sunny Foundation in the United States, he said in an online tribute. 'She never stopped giving, and, in all of this, she kept gratitude at the heart of her practice. Always grateful for beauty, for animals, for nature, for friendship, for life,' he said.
The 42
4 hours ago
- The 42
Galway still leaning on the same few warriors as Micheál Donoghue searches for consistency
BACK IN 2016, when Micheál Donoghue undertook his first tour of duty as Galway manager, the jigsaw pieces were already on the table. The team had come off a second All-Ireland final defeat in four years. Still, the players saw room for improvement, judging by the acrimonious vote of no confidence which put paid to Anthony Cunningham's tenure. They had come close to the mountain top and were now launching a mutiny to climb even higher. For their first league outing, an impressive six-point win over Cork, Donoghue sent out a team featuring a dozen of those beaten finalists of the previous September. Eleven who played that day would feature a year and a half later when Donoghue led Galway to the promised land. This time around, Donoghue returned to the hot seat with seven debutants and a 12-point defeat to Tipperary. What Donoghue witnessed fell far short of the minimum requirements for work rate, which the Clarinbridge native has emphasised at every opportunity across the subsequent four months. Only five of the starting team survived to face Kilkenny the following week. None of the 10 excluded have regained their places in his preferred championship team. However, that game could neither be counted as a turning point nor has progression been linear since then. That 12-point margin of defeat has recurred three more times; against Limerick, Cork, and Kilkenny in consecutive road trips across March and April. In that time, Donoghue has trialled a whopping 57 players, giving game time to 40. The experimentation has continued into championship, particularly in their attack. He called on 29 players in the Leinster round-robin. Galway's defeat to Kilkenny prompted a rethink. Leah Scholes / INPHO Leah Scholes / INPHO / INPHO Compared to their position of strength back in 2017, when they pocketed Liam MacCarthy and the first of four consecutive All-Ireland minor titles in one memorable afternoon, their squad looks callow. Six of those All-Ireland winners remain ever-present cogs. But those minor teams have been slow to produce senior dividends. The first of those champion sides developed the likes of Darach Fahy, Darren Morrissey, Cianan Fahy, Ronan Glennon, and recent debutant Colm Molloy. Of the 2018 victors, however, only Dónal O'Shea has featured at any stage for the Tribesmen this term. Even the transition to U20 hasn't quite worked. They haven't won an All-Ireland at that grade since 2011, and were beaten by double-digits in both finals they've reached in the meantime. Perhaps the defining characteristic of Donoghue's 2017 champions was the combination of size, power, and ball-winning ability, plus the sharp scoring touch, of their forwards. An attack built around Joseph Cooney, Joe Canning, Johnny Glynn, Conor Whelan, Conor Cooney, and Cathal Mannion was an imposing mix for any opponent. Advertisement Currently, Galway have a rotating cast of inside snipers. Declan McLoughlin bagged 2-2 against Kilkenny in the league as a late call-up. The next day, Anthony Burns stepped forward with 2-3 against Clare on his first start. That same evening, Evan Niland nailed 0-9 from 10 shots. Against Offaly, Molloy was a late change for his first start and raised 0-5 from play. They have each been in and out of the team as Donoghue seeks the right mix of grafters and scorers. Making the ball stick is the first imperative. Then, the score-taking comes in. Whelan and Mannion remain the heartbeat of their forward line as the players who best perform both roles. Similarly, Pádraic Mannion and Daithí Burke have filled in as the full-back-line anchors, while David Burke has provided the midfield shield. They still need those warriors to compensate for inexperience elsewhere. Conor Whelan signs autographs after the victory over Dublin. Laszlo Geczo / INPHO Laszlo Geczo / INPHO / INPHO Donoghue pointed to players 'learning the trade' after Dublin pilfered a couple of late goals to take the gloss off an eye-catching result at Parnell Park. Transition and evolution remain part of the vocabulary at this early stage. 'We're still only a short time here and everything is still evolving for us,' he added. 'We're still trying to get the magic number, if you like, of lads in their best positions.' All along, there has been hit-and-miss progress. Where they lost four games by 12 points, they have now taken care of business in the last four by an average margin of 14 points per victory. Where Mannion accounted for 49% of their scoring total in the first three championship games, they managed to construct an appropriate haul in his absence against Antrim and suitably diversified responsibility against Dublin. Where they didn't reach the 30-point barrier in their first seven games, they have broken it in three and clocked 0-29 in their fourth match since then. The goal-scoring balance remains an issue. They have only kept one clean sheet in 11 games this year. At the other end, they have been shut out four times themselves; even if Donoghue's side didn't need goals back in '17 either. They will be tested at both ends by Kilkenny in the Leinster final. There remains a significant distance to travel before Galway could be classed as Liam MacCarthy contenders. But should they smuggle the Bob O'Keeffe Cup back across the Shannon after six years characterised by near misses and flops, their prize would be an All-Ireland semi-final. One that avoids the Munster champions too. From there, a return to the biggest stage wouldn't look so far. They have cast off one hex by beating Dublin, and with that, accomplished a significant marker of progress from the early elimination that ended Henry Shefflin's reign. Donoghue, as the Dubs' head honcho, was responsible for that downfall. His return has reinstituted the minimum acceptable levels of performance for this new-look group. Consistency is the next marker. Then, a Leinster title. Then, we would get a better sense of what's achievable in the rest of Donoghue's four-year term.
