Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy raised a question regarding the difference between the Civil Service and the public service. Civil servants - "servant" is a lovely word - are those who work in government, while the term "public servant" refers to everybody else who is employed in the public service, including gardaí, teachers, nurses and doctors. Our ambition in the programme is to build an integrated public service for the first time. We started by trying to build an integrated Civil Service and we have established the senior Civil Service for the first time. I probably embarrassed somebody when I referred at a previous meeting of the joint committee to an occasion when all of our ambassadors were called home. Most ambassadors are at assistant secretary level, with a small number at principal officer level. I used the opportunity to bring together all of the assistant secretaries in the public service to discuss the reform agenda. One of the issues about which I spoke to them was integration and free movement across the public sphere. The meeting attracted a good audience and I went through the reform agenda. Following the meeting, one distinguished ambassador who I will not embarrass by referring to him by name followed me out and said, "You did not mean us, of course." He had the notion that it would not be appropriate for civil servants from uncouth Departments to be arriving in the Department of Foreign Affairs. Barriers must be broken down to achieve the integration we seek and move people across Departments. This is a work in progress.

I do not share Deputy Michael Creed's scepticism about the Croke Park agreement being used as a box-ticking exercise.