Tom Kitt (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)

I apologise for the absence of the Minister for Defence due to illness.

The overall system of financial management and accountability in respect of defence spending was specially reviewed as part of the efficiency audit group process in the 1990s. As a result, the Government decided that the Secretary General of the Department of Defence should continue to be the Accounting Officer for all defence spending and that greater financial authority should be delegated to the military authorities. This position was restated in the White Paper on Defence, published in February 2000.

Since the Pricewaterhouse report, a substantial amount of day-to-day expenditure has been delegated to the Chief of Staff of the Defence Forces. More than €215 million, including €59 million for Permanent Defence Force allowances, has been delegated in 2008. The delegated amount represents 68% of total Defence Forces non-pay expenditure in the 2008 defence Estimate. The delegation covers a wide range of spending areas, including Defence Forces allowances, transport, equipment, training, engineering and IT. In addition, the Chief of Staff has authority to undertake general recruitment within the overall approved strength level of 10,500 personnel in the Permanent Defence Force.

The present system of delegating financial authority to the Chief of Staff has worked well and the current approach meets overall defence requirements from both an operational and a financial management point of view. The civil and military elements of the Department of Defence jointly operate a modern management information framework. Senior civil and military management meet on a regular basis at the high level planning and procurement group and the strategic management committee to review and monitor financial and other performance indicators. These systems work very well and there are no plans to change them. It is, of course, a matter for other organisations to adopt financial management systems best suited to their own requirements.

The defence organisation as a whole has been one of the success stories of the public service reform and modernisation agenda in recent years. The management and accountability framework within which both the Department of Defence and the Defence Forces operate has contributed to this achievement.

See this speech in context