Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

As the Deputy will be aware, the selection process for the appointment to the position of Secretary General in the Department of Health was undertaken by the Top Level Appointments Committee, TLAC, with the assistance of the Public Appointments Service, PAS. The Government is committed to ensuring a policy of open recruitment and the role of TLAC, as an independent body, is to support that and ensure that the recruitment and selection process for the vast majority of senior Civil Service posts is accessible to the widest pool of qualified candidates. TLAC operates under the code of practice issued by the Commission for PAS in accordance with the principles of merit, consistency, accountability, probity, best practice and professional confidentiality.

The position of Secretary General in the Department of Health was openly advertised on 8 January 2021. Applications for this competition closed on 28 January. In addition to being published by PAS on its publicjobs.ieportal, the position was extensively advertised internationally online on selected relevant websites and through targeted social media. PAS also issued job alerts by email and text message to those who have registered their interest in positions at this level on the publicjobs.iewebsite. TLAC has also circulated it to Departments as well as other public service bodies. In this instance, TLAC received 23 applications for the position of Secretary General in the Department of Health. Of the 23 applications received, 20 identified as being Irish nationals and three identified as being international. Three candidates were shortlisted for final consideration under the TLAC process. All three shortlisted candidates identified as being Irish. Following the conclusion of the independent TLAC process, the appointment of the next Secretary General in the Department of Health was considered at yesterday’s Cabinet meeting. The Deputy will be aware that Mr. Robert Watt has been appointed to this critical role.

In addition, TLAC makes available an annual report to me which is published on my Department’s website. The report provides summary information on all TLAC competitions completed in the previous year, including reporting of key trends and analysis having regard to the composition of all applications for TLAC competitions.

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