Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for her questions. I do not want to give the illusion there is now a free hand to recruit, because there is not. We made very difficult gains by reducing public sector numbers very considerably - by 10% overall. We do not have the capacity to restore all of that. We have looked at delivering systems more efficiently over the past four years.

In terms of the apprentice issue about which the Deputy spoke in Dublin City Council and so on, we had a detailed discussion in Cabinet in the past fortnight on the whole issue of apprentices and a number of initiatives are being taken. The Office of Public Works has opened an initiative to recruit apprentices and I met with the chairperson of the OPW this week to discuss that. SOLAS also has an initiative which will be announced. A number of private sector and public sector companies will take on multiples of apprentices in the future because not everybody will go into an academic environment. There will be a skills shortages as the economy recovers in these areas, so the Deputy makes a very valid point in that regard.

In regard to the devolution, it is not that I will ask line managers to make a case to me. I want to devolve the capacity to them. They will have their budget line and they may want to expend it in a different way. Rather than simply recruiting one person at a fixed rate, I would prefer to have two at a different rate. They will have the flexibility to do that.

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