Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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Question 4: To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Finance the specific changes he plans to deliver public service reform. [15893/08]

Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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Public service reform is essentially about improving the service provided to citizens at all levels in the most efficient and cost effective way. Any reasonable analysis must acknowledge that the public service has come a long way since the strategic management initiative was launched over a decade ago with the objective of ensuring that the public service would make a greater contribution to national development, be a provider of services to the public and make effective use of resources. Our public services have been expanded, improved and reformed. There have been significant improvements in the areas of financial management, human resources management, regulatory reforms, e-Government initiatives, and customer service delivery mechanisms.

The implementation of the modernisation agenda has been, and continues to be, driven by the various partnership agreements across the public service. The current partnership agreement, Towards 2016, builds on the progress made under previous agreements and ensures continued co-operation with change and further modernisation initiatives as well as improvements in productivity right across the public service. It provides an important framework for meeting the economic and social challenges ahead and builds on the achievements of previous agreements.

Towards 2016 sets out a mechanism for the verification of progress at sectoral, organisational and grade level in the public service through the establishment of a performance verification group for each of the sectors — the Civil Service, the health, education and local authority sectors, the Garda Síochána and Defence Forces. Under the terms of Towards 2016, payment of each of the public service pay increases is dependent on verification of satisfactory achievement in regard to co-operation with flexibility and ongoing change, including co-operation with satisfactory implementation of the agenda for modernisation set out in the agreement, maintenance of stable industrial relations and the absence of industrial action in respect of any matters covered by the agreement.

Of course, any reasonable analysis will also acknowledge that while significant progress has been made over the past decade in modernising the public service, many more changes are both awaited and needed. At a time when the Government has been investing unprecedented levels of resources in public services, problems remain — mainly with delivery on the ground and maximising return on investment. There now needs to be a step change in the delivery of public services, with a focus on a more citizen-centred approach.

Additional information not given on the floor of the House.

This is why the Government asked the OECD to carry out a review of the Irish public service. The Government wanted the OECD to examine rigorously the connections between the investment decisions that are being made at the Cabinet table and delivery to citizens on the ground. The OECD was given two tasks — first, to benchmark the public service in Ireland against other comparable countries; and second, to make recommendations as to future directions for public service reform which will support the Irish Government's drive for delivery of world class services to the citizen, within existing resources, and contribute to sustainable national competitive advantage. Put simply, the Government was asking the OECD to examine how Government priorities and decisions are translated into services and outcomes for citizens, and how these processes can be improved. The review is intended to highlight what is working and what is not working and help us make better informed choices about developing our public services.

The OECD review will be published next Monday. It will make a major contribution to the ongoing modernisation of the Irish public service. It will provide a health check on the state of the public service. More than that, it will provide us with a direction for the future. It may deliver some stark messages but that is precisely what we asked the OECD to do so we must be prepared to listen to what it says. I and my colleagues will be giving careful consideration to its recommendations.

Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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The Minister has said public service reform is his first priority but in the two minutes of his reply he did not offer a single specific initiative. The Minister has been in the Cabinet for 13 years and has been responsible for the public service for four years but he has no proposal to offer the Dáil on the eve of his taking office as Taoiseach. Would the Minister agree to an audit of quangos, as proposed by Fine Gael, so we can start to rationalise duplication that is evident? Would he agree to changes in the linking of pay and performance? To return to Deputy O'Donnell's point, this is at the core of disquiet at the payment of top earners in the public service. Would the Minister agree to an efficiency programme to squeeze back the administration in Departments? Would he agree to abandon ill-conceived elements of the decentralisation programme, which is wastefully absorbing a great deal of the time of public agencies? Would he agree to change the archaic way in which we deal with the Estimates and the budget on one day and make a decision without any meaningful scrutiny of what they are to achieve? Is there anything the Minister is going to change?

Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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I have already brought forward initiatives relating to the budget that mean the Deputy and others in committees can look at output statements and examine whether we are getting the outputs Departments set for themselves at the beginning of the year. I have unified the budget process considerably and I would have thought there would be some acknowledgement of change in this area. If this is to be ignored then that is fine.

It is clear that as we seek to manage the public finances and understand the requirements of the situation in the short to medium term, decisions will be needed across the board on a range of issues. We are talking about further public sector reform and the OECD report is due on Monday. I believe it will set out a good analysis, in terms of benchmarking, of the performance of the Civil Service and public service compared to others and will suggest improvements. In a unionised environment, on the basis of partnership, we must also recognise the need to get improvements and agreements in place that can be provided for in the context of the pay negotiations we are now embarking on. We must get on this agenda and bring about improvements. There have been improvements but no one is suggesting we are in a satisfactory position, given the expectations of our citizens. The agenda will continue.

Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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The Minister must offer leadership in this area and cannot move at the pace of the slowest mover, that is, the approach he mentioned of waiting for agreement. I will list three simple political actions he can take. First, he could provide that every appointment to a new board of a State agency be approved by a Dáil committee. Second, he could provide that the Comptroller and Auditor General have a mandate to examine corporate governance in order to foresee any potential mistakes, not waiting for the milk to be spilt. Third, will the Minister give the evaluation of public spending programmes to the Oireachtas and not to Departments? There should be proper evaluation and scrutiny of public spending by Members.

Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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In fairness, a structure is in place for the committees of this House to analyse Government expenditure across all areas of the public service on the basis of targets they would place for themselves. Before I introduced changes to the budgetary process, there were criticisms of no references to outputs. I have put an obligation on all Departments to set out their outputs at the beginning of every year and to explain why if they do not reach them.

Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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I am asking the Minister to do something different, something new.

Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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It is not just a question of doing something different and what I just referred to is new. It was not done in the Deputy's time in the Department or ever before.

Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)
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It was done in the 1980s.

Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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The committee system has a large responsibility. I suggest that should be used for effective scrutiny. Although I am not a close watcher of everything going on in every committee, from my observations I note that committees decide their own agendas as to who attends and when depending on what issue arises daily or weekly, when they could set out a strategic job of work to be done. If we used the potential of the reforms I have outlined which would bring relevance to debate in a timely manner it would be helpful to the Executive and the standing of the House.