Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

As I noted in my opening remarks, the issue of accountability is at the heart of the reform. When we pulled back the layers and considered everything that happened in the past, it often came down to a systems failure in which no one actually was accountable or no one was responsible. We use those words and throw them out but what do the words "accountable", "responsible" or "answerable" mean? They all have different meanings in respect of Ministers, senior civil servants and so on. We must try to work towards a system in which people know for what they are responsible - I hope to do that in legislative terms - and therefore, for what they are accountable. I also have made the point previously about an idea from which we must get away. At present, we almost have a "Gotcha" culture, in which it is a good thing if one can nail someone and failure is never acceptable. However, the corollary is one ends up with civil servants who will not make decisions because if one never makes a decision, one will never be wrong. As for always being safe, over the past three years my Department certainly would not have been able to do the job it did had it not been able to make sometimes difficult decisions on a daily basis. Sometimes, risky decisions were made because one never is certain of outcomes. By the time one evaluates and measures everything to the degree that is safe, one can end up being too late and the damage done. Therefore, we certainly need a degree of accountability, as well as a clear understanding of what it is for which people are responsible.

The Chairman mentioned the issue concerning hierarchy and I note the grading structure is under consideration. In the documentation on which I worked in advance of the election, which was replicated in some of the work carried out by Fine Gael, we came to the conclusion that there probably are too many grades within the Civil Service and too many people overseeing others, as opposed to doers. Moreover, there is not enough devolved responsibility and accountability and this is the sort of work that must be done. However, hand in glove with such work is the need to have proper training because in the past, people often were given jobs. One was promoted to be a procurement officer or a human resources person without any proper training. This cannot be and there must be professionalism in this regard. This is the reason I believe one will see a different model of intake into the Civil Service in the future. Not everyone will be a generalist but far more specialists will be recruited. At senior level, many more contract people will come in for specific functions for specific periods and hopefully, there will be a great deal more interaction between the private sector and the Civil Service. These are the models on which I would work. Finally, the Chairman made a very good point about team building in that an essential part of any modern enterprise is that one works as a team and not in a hierarchy under someone's control.