Mr. Daithí Ó Caigne:

We do not make a decision as to what should be the requirement of a Department. The Department identifies its requirements and we try to ensure that we are efficient in terms of our recruitment processes, which is why the principle is to aggregate the individual demands. Departments also have what are known as delegated sanctions. The position the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform adopted a number of years ago where it could prescribe what should and should not happen has been relaxed by it by delegating sanctions to Departments up to certain levels to determine what their own resources should be and the composition of those resources.