Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform his preferred options in respect of public expenditure curtailment and reform through the public service over the next two years; the full extent of savings to date achieved arising from commitments entered into prior to or since the EU bailout; the degree to which he expects to achieve further economies in the coming years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51598/12]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the extent to which he has examined the impact of the budgetary cutbacks which he inherited from his predecessors throughout the spectrum of the public services; if delivery of some element of public service has been more severely affected than others; if he will introduce any particular initiatives to address any such issues; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51597/12]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the extent to which economies achieved by his Department in each of the past three years to date have been achieved by way of direct cuts in expenditure, savings or other means; if any particular evaluation has been done to ascertain the most cost-efficient and effective strategies; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51903/12]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the extent to which he expects to be in a position to reward or incentivise Government Departments or authorities, State or semi-State bodies that have achieved particularly satisfactory results over the past four years to date in respect of targets set to achieve savings or cuts in public expenditure; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51904/12]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the extent to which particular Government Departments or bodies under their aegis have achieved particularly impressive results in terms of savings or cost-cutting with the minimum job losses in the course of the past twelve months; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51905/12]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the extent to which targets set by his Department in terms of budgetary cutbacks and savings arising from the Memorandum of Understanding entered into by his predecessors have been achieved in each of the past three years to date; the extent to which he expects the remaining targets to be achieved on time; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51906/12]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the extent to which the running costs of all Government Departments and their respective public or subsidiary bodies have achieved targets in terms of costs or spending cuts over the past three years to date; the extent of the scope remaining, if any, throughout; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51907/12]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform arising from discussions he has had with his EU counterparts, the degree to which savings and expenditure cuts achieved by his Department compares with other EU countries both within the Eurozone and without; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51908/12]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform having regard to the most recent discussions with the Troika, if he and they are satisfied with the achievements to date and the future potential for savings; if any particular emphasis has been placed on the specific means of achieving targets in the course of such discussions; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51909/12]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the means by which the greatest savings have been achieved throughout all Government Departments; if by reform or direct budgetary cuts; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51911/12]

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 9, 46, 97 to 103 inclusive, and 105 together.

Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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Can the Minister list the questions again?

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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These are all the questions in the name of Deputy Bernard Durkan. He is a very diligent Deputy.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Prolific.

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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The Government is making good progress on achieving all of our targets and priorities, as set out in the Government programme. We are bringing public expenditure back to a sustainable level and driving forward the public service reform agenda to ensure efficiencies and reformed work practices play a full part in contributing to the overall budgetary consolidation effort.

When determining fiscal policy, the Government has to take account of a wide range of often competing considerations and policy priorities. The Government decides on the balance between these priorities in setting the broad budgetary parameters - the overall budgetary balance, taxation priorities and the aggregate levels for expenditure. The comprehensive review of expenditure was the culmination of an intensive exercise carried out by all Departments in 2011 to identify means of reducing expenditure in line with commitments under the joint EU-IMF programme of financial support, while minimising the impact on service delivery. All proposals, including those from members of the public and third party submissions, were fully appraised for the exercise and the outcomes were published in the Comprehensive Expenditure Report 2012-2014.

The 2013 ministerial expenditure ceilings were introduced on an administrative basis and I intend to migrate it to a statutory basis. The precise composition of the 2013 budgetary consolidation is a matter for Government, the details of which will be announced in the House on 5 December. In keeping with an EU-IMF programme commitment, the administrative ceilings are to be put on a statutory footing, which will be done by legislation brought to the House this session, I hope.

The substantial fiscal consolidation implemented in 2011 was part of the reason for the reduction in the underlying general Government deficit, from 10.7% of GDP in 2010 to 9.1% of GDP last year, well within the EU-IMF programme target of 10.6% of GDP. This result was attained despite weaker domestic demand, reflecting the Government’s strong revenue administration and firm control of expenditure. All end-quarter Exchequer primary balance and central Government net debt targets set out in the programme have been met.

The central expenditure evaluation unit, CEEU, within the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform promotes best practice in the evaluation of programme expenditure across all Departments and public sector agencies. As part of the comprehensive review of expenditure, the CEEU also produced a series of cross-cutting evaluation papers covering a range of topics that were published on the Department's website in 2011. The role of evaluation was further enhanced by the introduction earlier this year of the Irish Government economic and evaluation service. The work of the service will support Departments in evaluating policy and expenditure options, value for money exercises, cost benefit and regulatory impact analyses, and regulatory and competition issues. These are many of the points recommended to us by Deputy Donnelly. We have recruited a cohort of people who are being trained in my Department. They will be farmed out, if that is not a vulgar term, to work in Departments.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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I did not get to read all of Deputy Durkan's many questions.

Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael)
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We will send Deputy McDonald a copy.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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I am surprised the Minister did not allude to his plans for Croke Park nua in respect of future savings. We have not yet had a briefing or account from the Minister on the approach but we have seen the notion of securing a further €1 billion in savings through that mechanism. Will the Minister take the opportunity to say a few words on that?

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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I am delighted to do so if the Leas-Cheann Comhairle allows me to. I brought a proposal to Government yesterday on foot of the analysis that has concerned me for some time. If someone asked me my greatest concern as Minister over the past number of months, it is the unallocated savings facing the economy next year and in 2014. The medium-term fiscal framework set out expenditure reductions in social welfare, health and across every line Department. At the end of that, a gift from the previous Government is the unallocated savings, which must either be farmed out to individual Departments by making further cuts on top of those already outlined or we must look for another way of dealing with them.

I have been grappling with that for some time. My strong view is that we need to look at 35% of all current expenditure, which is the pay bill, to see if we can get more from that.

I am calling this a Croke Park extension. I want to maintain the principles of Croke Park, which are no compulsory redundancies and the maintenance of core pay. We need to get pay savings, however, and I will be tabling a variety of means to deal with that. I have invited the unions to talk to me next week in order that I can set out my stall. The profiling I am looking for is to begin the process of additionality next year. In the existing pay savings profile I am aiming to reduce the pay bill by 20% by 2015, which is a quantum, in net terms, of about €3.3 billion. I am now proposing that we look for an additional €1 billion over those three years so that the annualised pay saving by 2015 would be an additional €1 billion.

This will be challenging and difficult. The way I have set out to do this is through longer working hours in the public service, changing the framework of the working week, and so on. I do not want to be too prescriptive until I have had a chance to lay out my stall to the public sector unions. I will keep the House informed because this is an important endeavour. If we can sign off on an agreement before the middle of next year we can start the savings next year so that public servants will have a sense of security between now and the end of this Dáil. They will know where they are and can spend and work with security. It will also give security to the Government to know that our ambitious target of bringing the public finances into balance, having a deficit of less than 3% by 2015, will be achieved.

Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister for mentioning that issue. The original Croke Park agreement allows for average payroll savings of only 1% for each of the next couple of years, which is quite modest. I note that the Minister has come to that conclusion himself.

The Minister did not mention allowances. Has he moved away from that or has he found the issue to be more complicated than he originally thought? I wish him more success than he had with his original proposal to deal with allowances.

Public servants with salaries of more than €100,000 should not receive increases in salary. The concept of someone who is earning more than €100,000 getting a pay rise next year, even if it is called an increment, is immoral and should not be tolerated. The people of Ireland will not tolerate it. It might be claimed that increments are part of core pay, but they are not specifically mentioned in the Croke Park agreement and the matter is open for discussion. Nobody could countenance increases in pay next year, by way of increment, for the highest paid public servants. That has to stop.

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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The architecture of the current Croke Park agreement, which I have defended and worked to the best of my ability, was not of my construction.

Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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The Minister praised it.

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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Absolutely. What I inherited was a useful and important enabler for change. I have said that publicly and I acknowledge that. I have worked the agreement to the very best. It is not, however, a robust enough instrument to get us to where we need to be by 2015.

Deputy Fleming made some points about fairness, with which I would not disagree. However, there is no point in saying I would love to do something, even if it is demonstrably fair, if it is not possible legally or would risk being overturned by the courts.

I do not want to be too expansive in discussions here before I talk to representatives of workers directly which, as a matter of courtesy, I should do. In the context of a new extension to Croke Park, however, I hope to be able to deal with a number of issues that Deputies across the House have, fairly, put on the table. I will keep Deputies informed as we make progress along the way. I hope all Deputies will use their influence to encourage engagement with the process to bring about a conclusion that will be good for public service workers and the public at large and will guarantee that we will get out of our dependency on the troika programme and back to normal funding at an early date.