Mr. Seán Ó Foghlú:

I thank the Chairman for the opportunity to make this opening statement to the committee on special report No. 88 of the Comptroller and Auditor General on the restructuring of the administration of student grants. As requested, I forwarded an advance briefing to the committee and will keep my opening remarks as brief as possible.

The Comptroller and Auditor General's report clearly outlines the circumstances surrounding the planning and implementation phases of this project, which was designed to integrate a number of means-tested schemes and centralise administration from 66 awarding authorities to a single, unified authority. The report analyses the key issues relevant to the establishment of SUSI and identifies in particular the factors which ultimately resulted in a period of delays in 2012 to 2013 which caused distress for many students. I express my sincere apologies for the difficulties encountered in the opening months of SUSI's operation and for any distress or inconvenience caused to grant applicants and their families. Equally, the report notes the much improved performance in 2013 to 2014. That improvement has been built on and consolidated in 2014 and 2015. The Department of Education and Skills has given careful consideration to the content of the report and the recommendations for the Department arising from it. The Department is committed to implementing the recommendations and has made substantial progress in that regard. Specifically, the Department has revised fundamentally its approach to change management planning and governance through the establishment of a programme office within the Department to support the implementation of major projects under the public service reform plan.

The planning and implementation of the reform of the administration of student grants took place in a very difficult and different economic environment. There was little scope to put in place the dedicated additional resources now recommended for projects of this size and scale.

New applications for student grants were increasing at an unprecedented rate, while the capacity of local authorities and VECs to deal with the increase was diminished by the impact of the public service moratorium. Government decided that a single agency solution should be implemented and the Department drew on the expertise and experience of existing State bodies in developing and implementing that solution.

Despite the absence of detailed baseline information and the very real challenges experienced in securing key inputs, particularly staff, the Department worked hard with the CDETB, the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and others to address and resolve these problems. When the processing difficulties arose in 2012, additional resources were immediately deployed to ensure that these were resolved as quickly as possible and to ameliorate the impact on students. By January 2013, the number of grant applications processed by SUSI was already 18% ahead of the equivalent figure in 2012.

The two subsequent years of operation have seen very substantial improvements in SUSI's delivery of service. In line with the 2013 Accenture review, SUSI has streamlined and simplified its grant application processes and improved its communications, stakeholder management and the customer experience. In particular, improved data sharing arrangements with other Departments and agencies have facilitated more accurate verification of information, and significantly reduced the burden documentation for applicants.

The Department has strengthened SUSI's resourcing, programme governance and organisation. It has provided for an augmented management structure and increased staffing capacity within SUSI. It has put in place a management framework agreement with the CDETB to steer ongoing service improvement in SUSI. Key performance indicators and service metrics are in place to ensure that service delivery is on track and critical requirements in areas such as funding, risk control and compliance are being met. The arrangements for implementation of the management framework agreement include regular structured engagement between the Department and the CDETB through monthly operations review meetings and quarterly business reviews.

Over the past two years, SUSI has dealt successfully with significant increases in the overall number of new and renewal applications, while improving the quality of its service on an ongoing basis. Figures submitted in advance briefing to the committee indicated that despite a doubling of the number of applications, processing performance is now better than at any time over the past ten years. The provision of an integrated grants processing system for SUSI, under the public sector reform shared services initiative, with a target implementation date of March 2017, will provide an even greater scope for both cost efficiencies and service improvements into the future.

The experience of restructuring the administration of student grants and the establishment of SUSI hold out valuable learning for other major reform and public service transformation projects. The lessons for public sector reform have been identified and assessed in a recently published implementation case study report that was carried out for the Department by the Centre for Effective Services. The report has been disseminated through the reform and delivery office of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. It has also been forwarded to the committee.

The Department will continue to work with the CDETB, SUSI and all of the relevant stakeholders to ensure ongoing improvement in the administration of student grants and the continued delivery of a high level of service to grant applicants.