Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

Public service reform is essentially about improving the service provided to citizens at all levels in the most efficient and cost effective way. Any reasonable analysis must acknowledge that the public service has come a long way since the strategic management initiative was launched over a decade ago with the objective of ensuring that the public service would make a greater contribution to national development, be a provider of services to the public and make effective use of resources. Our public services have been expanded, improved and reformed. There have been significant improvements in the areas of financial management, human resources management, regulatory reforms, e-Government initiatives, and customer service delivery mechanisms.

The implementation of the modernisation agenda has been, and continues to be, driven by the various partnership agreements across the public service. The current partnership agreement, Towards 2016, builds on the progress made under previous agreements and ensures continued co-operation with change and further modernisation initiatives as well as improvements in productivity right across the public service. It provides an important framework for meeting the economic and social challenges ahead and builds on the achievements of previous agreements.

Towards 2016 sets out a mechanism for the verification of progress at sectoral, organisational and grade level in the public service through the establishment of a performance verification group for each of the sectors — the Civil Service, the health, education and local authority sectors, the Garda Síochána and Defence Forces. Under the terms of Towards 2016, payment of each of the public service pay increases is dependent on verification of satisfactory achievement in regard to co-operation with flexibility and ongoing change, including co-operation with satisfactory implementation of the agenda for modernisation set out in the agreement, maintenance of stable industrial relations and the absence of industrial action in respect of any matters covered by the agreement.

Of course, any reasonable analysis will also acknowledge that while significant progress has been made over the past decade in modernising the public service, many more changes are both awaited and needed. At a time when the Government has been investing unprecedented levels of resources in public services, problems remain — mainly with delivery on the ground and maximising return on investment. There now needs to be a step change in the delivery of public services, with a focus on a more citizen-centred approach.

Additional information not given on the floor of the House.

This is why the Government asked the OECD to carry out a review of the Irish public service. The Government wanted the OECD to examine rigorously the connections between the investment decisions that are being made at the Cabinet table and delivery to citizens on the ground. The OECD was given two tasks — first, to benchmark the public service in Ireland against other comparable countries; and second, to make recommendations as to future directions for public service reform which will support the Irish Government's drive for delivery of world class services to the citizen, within existing resources, and contribute to sustainable national competitive advantage. Put simply, the Government was asking the OECD to examine how Government priorities and decisions are translated into services and outcomes for citizens, and how these processes can be improved. The review is intended to highlight what is working and what is not working and help us make better informed choices about developing our public services.

The OECD review will be published next Monday. It will make a major contribution to the ongoing modernisation of the Irish public service. It will provide a health check on the state of the public service. More than that, it will provide us with a direction for the future. It may deliver some stark messages but that is precisely what we asked the OECD to do so we must be prepared to listen to what it says. I and my colleagues will be giving careful consideration to its recommendations.

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