Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I move: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."

This relatively short Bill amends the Public Service Management (Recruitment and Appointments) Act 2004. If passed, it will remove the legislative barriers to redeployment and overall mobility within the public service, thereby facilitating a greater movement of staff across the broader public service. This is vital as we seek to maximise the existing resources within the public service and where the redeployment of surpluses in one organisation to meet deficits in another is likely to continue for some time.

I am taking the opportunity of the passage of the Bill to remove a provision in the 2004 Act that provides for an exemption in respect of appointments recommended by the Top Level Appointments Committee, TLAC, following competitions confined to senior civil servants. The rationale for the exception was that civil servant candidates for senior posts had already been subjected to a recruitment and selection process regulated by the Commission for Public Service Appointments, CPSA. However, TLAC has been extended to candidates from outside the Civil Service since 2007. Consequently, the exemption no longer applies. As open competitions are now the norm, the TLAC appointments are subject to the provisions of the Act. I am taking this opportunity to reflect that reality in legislation by deleting the exemption that existed heretofore.

This Bill is underpinned by a clear vision for the public service of the future. This will be a public service that is better integrated, more responsive to the ever changing environment, and focus on the needs of citizens and business customers and on the need to deliver value for money to the taxpayer. It will be more open and accountable in how it spends taxpayer money and makes decisions.

Significant progress is being made in achieving this vision and in implementing a programme of reform with unprecedented scale and ambition. Our difficult fiscal position and increasing demands on our services are driving the reform agenda. We must continue the process of meeting the five major commitments in our public service reform plan.

Across Europe, the public service is operating in an environment of reduced resources and pressure on staff numbers. Renewing public service capacity is a key challenge for our European neighbours as well as for us, as the pace and scope of reform place extra demands on public administrations. This process will continue. The demand and supply pressures require more specialist skills and different sets of competencies in key strategic areas, including procurement, ICT and change management.

One of the key instruments for addressing the staffing capacity challenge as we move towards a fit-for-purpose administration is the adoption of a strategic workforce planning approach. It is vital that this approach be embedded as a core element of the business planning process. Workforce planning can be a powerful management tool and is most effective when integrated within a Department's strategy and budgetary processes in a way that supports strategic decision making by managers.

My Department is responsible for the roll-out of workforce planning across the Civil Service. The first iterations of the workforce plans were submitted last year and all Departments are preparing the next iteration based on the feedback to date. This will allow a more consistent approach to be adopted across the public service. It will also support central monitoring and play a key part in the provision of robust and timely information to decision makers. In turn, this will enable service-wide analysis of staffing supply and demand as part of ongoing Civil Service resourcing. We need to know where the pressures are, where there is a surplus and the capacity to move within.

The ultimate objective of the workforce planning process is to ensure that the right people are in the right place at the right time. The ability to redeploy staff from one post or organisation to another is a vital component in the development of a strategy to achieve a more fit-for-purpose public administration. Redeployment and mobility will be required on an ongoing basis to meet demands for staff from within existing public service resources to support the programmes and schemes determined by this House and the Government to be priorities.

Currently, definitive redeployment from one sector of the public service to another is not legally possible, which is surprising. Secondment arrangements are being used, pending the enactment of this legislation, to remove that legal barrier to movement. This is the purpose of the Bill. It will facilitate definitive cross-sectoral transfers, thereby providing certainty of assignment for those currently on secondments and for those who will move in future. It will also provide certainty for the sending and receiving organisations involved in the redeployment process in respect of their staff assignments.

Redeployment and mobility are not just aspirational objectives to be achieved as part of some future public service. The Croke Park agreement has been a key enabler of the public service reform plan and played a strong part in underpinning many of the changes that we have recently made in the public service. It provided an unprecedented opportunity to achieve change in an atmosphere of stable industrial relations and co-operation. For the first time, the agreement provided a basis for movement within the Civil Service. The health, local authority and education sectors were particularly involved, as internal redeployment was not possible between those bodies and non-commercial State bodies. These arrangements have played a key role in the reassignment of more than 10,000 staff, which is no mean achievement, and have been reaffirmed in the new arrangements under the Haddington Road agreement. Redeployment will continue to facilitate flexibility and ensure that we can make the best use of staff resources by moving people from areas that are not under pressure to those of greatest need.

Previously, I outlined in the Chamber why it was necessary to make such a substantial ask of public servants under the Croke Park and Haddington Road agreements. I have acknowledged that public servants have contributed significantly to addressing the fiscal and economic challenges through the pension levy imposed in 2009, pay reductions and other measures, including head count reductions, reduced salary rates for new entrants and reductions in pension-related payments.

As part of the renegotiation process that resulted in these outcomes, the Government has agreed that compulsory redundancies will not apply to public servants, subject to an agreed flexibility on redeployment. Where moves to other employment have been agreed in this context, the Bill will enable definitive cross-sectoral assignments to be made by removing legal impediments. In doing so, it will enable the Government to meet part of its commitments under the Croke Park and Haddington Road agreements.

I advise the House that I intend to table amendments to this Bill on Report Stage that will set out the terms of a new sick leave scheme for the public service and give the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the power to vary that scheme in certain circumstances. In 2012, my Department engaged with the public service unions on the introduction of revised sick leave arrangements across the public service, as Deputies will know. There was extensive debate about it in the media and the Chamber. The proposed changes provided for a reduction in access to paid sick leave across the public service with a view to ensuring greater productivity and a reduction in the costs associated with sick leave. A number of issues that could not be agreed were referred to the Labour Court for a binding recommendation. The Attorney General has advised that, in order to ensure a uniform application of those recommendations and to address existing contractual rights, it is necessary to put a statutory system in place setting out the broad terms of the new public service leave scheme and allow me, as the Minister, to make variations to the scheme in certain circumstances.

I will go through the sections of this brief Bill. Section 1 defines the Public Service Management (Recruitment and Appointments) Act 2004 as the Principal Act. Section 2 defines a "public service body" for the purposes of the redeployment function, which is assigned to the Public Appointments Service, PAS, under sections 4 to 6, inclusive, as including all public service employers except commercial State bodies and their subsidiaries. Section 3 removes the existing exemption under section 7(2)(a) from the general provisions of the Principal Act in respect of TLAC appointments, bringing these within the ambit of this legislation.

Sections 4 to 6, inclusive, provide for the insertion of a new section 34A and a new Part 6A, which comprises sections 57A to 57F, inclusive, into the Principal Act. Section 34A provides that the PAS shall have the functions set out in Part 6A. Section 57A provides that a person designated by the PAS for redeployment to a position in another public service body shall be appointed to that position. Section 57B enables the PAS to designate a public service employee for redeployment to a comparable position elsewhere in the public service. A person on a fixed term contract may be redeployed for the period remaining on their contract. The assignment of this role to the PAS is fully consistent with its current statutory role as the main recruiter for the public service and with its role in operating the existing redeployment arrangements for transfers between public service bodies under the Croke Park and Haddington Road agreements.

During the examination of the Bill in the Seanad, concern was expressed that the legislation may provide the PAS with an unbridled power to establish a system under which employees may be compulsorily forced to move. As I did in the Seanad, it is important to state clearly that the Bill will not provide such power to the PAS in any circumstance. The Bill is designed to facilitate definitive cross-sectoral moves that have been agreed in the context of Croke Park and Haddington Road agreements. It will not be a legislative measure to force reassignments that are not agreed.

If cross-sectoral moves are agreed with specific individuals in future, including outside the terms of a specific collective agreement, the Bill will also facilitate those, provided that they are not in conflict with the Minister's overall policy on mobility and redeployment.

Under section 57D, the Bill provides that the PAS shall have regard to the terms of any policy for the time being of the Minister relating to mobility or redeployment. The policy of the Minister is framed within the parameters of the employment legislation in force and the common law. It is also be subject to judicial review.

If the employment protections afforded to public servants through various employment laws and the common law were to be ignored or were not appropriately applied and an attempt was made to force the redeployment of a public servant cross-sectorally, the person concerned would have the full protection of existing labour law and full recourse to the courts to vindicate those rights.

Section 57C provides that redeployment is to be on no less favourable terms and conditions in relation to basic pay, defined in section 57A, and pension, except in relation to fast accrual arrangements. It will provide certainty for the individuals being redeployed in two ways. First, it provides for the transfer of the responsibility to meet the redeployee's superannuation liabilities legally to the receiving organisation. Second, it provides for the preservation of various statutory rights of the redeployee that are linked to length of service. These include rights accruing under the Redundancy Acts, Unfair Dismissal Act, Minimum Notice and Terms of Employment Act and the Parental Leave Act. Section 57C also provides that those assigned to the Civil Service will be subject to the Civil Service Regulation Acts and the Ethics in Public Office Acts.

The provisions in the Bill in relation to the pay terms that will apply on redeployment have been drafted to give effect to the agreements reached with trade unions. Those agreements take account of the continuing need to stabilise the public finances and to meet the State's obligations with regard to the reduction of its deficit. The approach on pay on redeployment has been in operation for the past two years and will continue under this legislation.

During examination of the Bill in the Seanad, concern was expressed that the person redeploying will not be allowed to keep specific allowances or overtime pay when they redeploy to another post. In all cases, staff moving are assigned to grades where the duties and pay are as close as possible to those applying in their previous role prior to redeployment. If a person is earning additional pay for carrying out a specific duty or for working unsocial hours and they move to a post where those unsocial hours no longer apply, obviously the associated pay would cease.

It is important to note in this context that it has been agreed with the unions through the Labour Court, that those in receipt of allowances may be compensated for the loss of routine and structured allowances. It is also important to note that the provision in the Bill sets the minimum floor on the pay levels that must be applied on redeployment in every case. It does not preclude the application of a different, more favourable regime in the future when public finances permit.

Section 57D sets out factors to be considered by the PAS when designating a person for redeployment. These are the competencies, qualifications, grading and pay rates of the person being redeployed and those required in the post to which the person is being assigned; the terms of any policy of the Minister, and any collective agreement, relating to the mobility or redeployment of public service employees; and the methods of recruitment and selection applying to public servants generally.

Section 57E sets out details of those who are precluded from redeployment by the PAS. These are holders of political, judicial and constitutional posts, presidential and Government appointees, as well as special advisers, members of the Permanent Defence Force and An Garda Síochána, officers of the Houses of the Oireachtas, and those employed by the Central Bank of Ireland and the National Treasury Management Agency. This section also provides that the Minister may, by order, add further bodies to this list.

Section 57F removes any impediments under the Data Protection Act 1988 to the transfer of personal information to the PAS, or to another public service body, for the purpose of redeployment to that body. This concerns normal payroll and other personnel information.

Section 7 corrects Schedule 2 of the Principal Act to reflect the fact that there is no section 14(4) in the Aviation Regulation Act 2001 - I know that will come as a stunning shock to the House - and the Schedule should refer instead to section 11(4) of that Act. Section 8 inserts an additional Schedule to the Principal Act to list the commercial State bodies which are excluded from the definition of "public service body". Section 9 is a standard provision providing for a Short Title, and for commencement on a day to be appointed by ministerial order.

I ask the House to support and approve this Bill, which is part of the reform agenda to allow for what is going on. I am presenting it as an agreed approach with the trade union movement and under the auspices of the Labour Court. I commend the Bill to the House.

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