Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for his answer. It is clear from what he is saying that there will not be a specific review of the Haddington Road agreement. The Minister said that there will be something about it in the public service reform plan the Government is publishing in 2015. It is interesting that he went through that again with no specifics in terms of numbers across the public service - not just the Civil Service but the HSE, local authorities, education and teachers, which are covered by the Haddington Road agreement. He said generally that the figures would be masked in the budget figures the Government announces next week. That is symptomatic of this agreement.

The Minister seems to be suggesting that due to natural retirement, the cost of the public service is coming down because we have not been recruiting as many people as we did in the past except in key areas like teachers and some additional new gardaí. It is interesting that the Departments referred to by the Minister and to whom I have written have not been able to give me any specific savings as a result of the Haddington Road agreement. Savings are taking place in the public service with or without the agreement. We are trying to find out how many of those savings are attributable to the agreement but the Minister does not seem able to provide that information.

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