Kevin Humphreys (Dublin South East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome this type of initiative. I agree with Deputy Donnelly on the need for further detail, particularly on the budget prior to its announcement on 5 December. However, I will leave that for another day as the purpose of today's meeting is the Estimates for the Department of Finance.

The Minister stated that consultancy costs must be closely monitored and kept to a minimum. There has been a reduction of approximately 13 staff in the Department of Finance, some of whom are on career break and others of whom are on incentivised career breaks, at a cost to the Department of approximately €140,000 over the past three years. Has the Department undertaken a cost-benefit analysis of the career break scheme in terms of whether we are getting value for money from it? Is consultancy being used to compensate for staff on leave under the scheme?

On the ten staff on secondment to the Department from AIB, Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers, KPMG and McCann FitzGerald, is the cost of pay and pensions for these staff included in this Estimate? Has a cost-benefit analysis been undertaken of the recruitment of these people into the Department? I welcome that these staff are required to adhere to the Official Secrets and Ethics in Public Office Acts. However, I remain concerned about people from the private sector giving advice to the Minister given the advice previously given by them to other sectors of the economy.