Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

As the Deputy will be aware, open publicly advertised competition is a key principle of senior level appointments to posts across the public service reflecting the Government's commitment to ensure such posts, which are central to the effective performance of our system of public administration, are filled by high calibre candidates.

In my area of direct responsibility, recruitment into the civil service, including senior appointments, is by way of open competition and all recruitment competitions held by the Public Appointments Service, PAS, are advertised in one or more of the national papers or on the PAS website at: www.publicjobs.ie. Application forms, together with all relevant details, are made available when competitions are announced. Potential candidates can register their interest in a position on the PAS website and will then automatically be notified by e-mail when the competition is announced.

With regard to senior level appointments to the Civil Service at above principal officer level, the Top Level Appointments Committee, TLAC, holds competitions for and advises Ministers and Government as appropriate on appointments to civil service posts at Secretary General, deputy secretary and assistant secretary and equivalent levels. Since early 2007 the policy has been that open competitions are held for assistant secretary and deputy secretary and equivalent posts and more recently this policy has been extended to Secretary General posts.

With regard to recruitment to the wider public service, various Ministers, in accordance with the legislation setting up public service bodies or agencies under their aegis, are responsible for matters relating to senior appointments in those bodies. Clearly, the public interest is usually best served by opening public service posts to the widest pool of candidates. The Deputy will recall that the recent appointment of an Ombudsman was made following an open and public request I made for expressions of interest from appropriately qualified candidates.

See this speech in context