Mr. David Moloney:

I thank the Deputy. The purpose of trying to formalise the secondment policy in the circular, which is, I think, the first time it was done, was to try to clarify some of the issues that arose over time, where secondments were conducted in a variety of different ways. In effect, many secondments became permanent by being rolled over on a continual basis. The Civil Service mobility scheme, which was introduced and now covers all general service grades between clerical officer and assistant secretary, formalises the process of permanently transferring staff between Departments in the Civil Service. Therefore, the remaining bit for secondment policy to do, outside of niche areas, specialist expertise or long-standing arrangements that are in place, is to try to regularise how temporary secondments take place.

There is a further complication in that where we second from the Civil Service to an outside body, the terms and conditions such as pension and other entitlements sometimes need to be maintained through a secondment arrangement and in some cases - for example, the two cases of Secretaries General I mentioned - that would make the secondment time limited but there is not an anticipation return to the Department.