Updated 6.52 pm

A MOTION TO reduce the salary of Amnesty International Ireland director Colm O’Gorman has been unanimously defeated at the organisation’s annual conference today.

The proposal called for O’Gorman’s €99,089 salary to be cut to the “total cost of all staff salaries divided by the total number of employees”. This could be the industrial average of €35,200.

But following a vote today the motion was “roundly defeated” according to the Amnesty International member who proposed it Kieran O’Sullivan.

O’Sullivan said that there was a debate about the motion but a consensus developed among members that it “would be impossible to recruit anyone at the salary level proposed”.

He also told TheJournal.ie that some members felt that a salary reduction would be perceived by some as a personal attack on O’Gorman which he said was not the case.

The proposal was made following concerns within the organisation of the effect recent controversies in the charitable sector is having on the public.

“The goodwill of the Irish people has been tested to the limit by the recent controversies over the excessive salaries of charity executives,”  O’Sullivan had earlier said proposing the motion.

- Additional reporting by Rónán Duffy

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