Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Government welcomes the Haddington Road proposals. Obviously, I am very grateful to the Labour Relations Commission for the work its staff have put into this, particularly the chief executive officer. Each union now has draft regulations for its own rules and procedures. The Government has published legislation which we must enact in any case to implement pay reductions and other changes. The Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform has estimated that €300 million can be saved by the end of this year and €1 billion by the end of 2015.

As regards the 29 departmental staff I mentioned, all of those work-sharing are female. They range from principal officer level down to clerical officers. The areas where people are work-sharing include the economic, international and Northern Ireland sections, as well as European affairs and co-ordination, protocol, corporate affairs, internal audit and the Office of the Tánaiste.

If a person wishes to work-share, we try to facilitate them if at all possible. The procedure to apply for work-sharing is set out in the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform's circular on work-sharing.

All applications are considered on a case-by-case basis, in light of the pressure on work in those Departments and the overall budgetary situation. If a staff member wishes to change the existing work sharing pattern it can be considered in the overall context of the business needs of the Department and budgetary considerations.

Staff avail of a variety of work-sharing patterns and they range from 40% to 80%. Examples of such patterns include a two-day week where there is a 40% whole-time equivalent, a three-day week where there it is 60%, a four-day week where it is 80% or a split week, two or three days each calendar week or 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. every day, and 73% get involved in that. A broad range of family-friendly and work-life balance schemes are available to staff across the civil service, but they are also available in the Department of the Taoiseach. They include work-sharing, flexitime, career breaks, a shorter working year scheme and special leave for domestic circumstances. Staff also have entitlements to a variety of statutory schemes such as maternity leave, paternal leave and force majeureleave. Requests for access to work-life balance schemes are facilitated in so far as we can. Flexitime is available to clerical staff, executive, higher executive and administrative officers and third secretaries in the Department.

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