Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

In the course of a newspaper interview last November, the Taoiseach said there was an urgent need for reform in the public service but that he felt the implementation of it would be in the medium to longer term. At what point in his 13 years as a Minister and Taoiseach since 1997 did he come to the conclusion there was an urgent need for public service reform?

Second, as I was unclear from the reply the Taoiseach gave to Deputy Kenny, is it or is it not the Taoiseach's intention when he reconfigures the Government to appoint a Minister with responsibility for public service reform? It would appear the appointment of such a ministry at Cabinet level is required in order to drive the reform of public service. We have had many reports on it and much talk about it but it needs to happen.

Third, the Taoiseach referred to the fact organisational reviews had been carried out in a number of Departments and he referred to the Department of Health and Children. There was a report in the newspapers on 18 February last which purported to come from somebody who saw a copy of the report that has been carried out. It states that some staff at the Department of Health and Children have little or nothing to do while colleagues are overwhelmed with work but management appears reluctant to deal with the problems. Is this the case?

Finally, the industrial action that is taking place has arisen from the fact that the Taoiseach commenced discussions with the public service trade unions about a reform package. He then collapsed those discussions, unilaterally cut the pay of the public servants and unilaterally introduced a number of other changes, including changes to pension arrangements. This has now given rise to the industrial action we have seen taking place since January and which is escalating. When people try to access various Departments, depending on the day they ring or try to make contact, if it is an industrial action day or afternoon, nobody answers the telephones or there is one kind of problem or another.

What I understood the Taoiseach to say to Deputy Kenny is that he does not think the time is yet right for discussions with the trade unions to try to resolve those issues. How much worse does the industrial action have to get before he will call in the trade unions, have discussions with them, try to resolve the issues and get normal work resumed throughout the various organs of the public service?

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