Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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8. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the number of public service allowances currently in place; the current state of plans to review these allowances; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23700/14]

Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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As part of the Haddington Road agreement, it was agreed between the Government and the unions that there would be a review of allowances paid in the public services. There are many substantial allowances. Some people agree some of them are outdated while most people agree a number of them are essential and should be retained, although possibly streamlined and incorporated into core pay where necessary. Where is the Minister on this and could he update us on progress?

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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I thank the Deputy for the question. More than 1,100 allowances were notified to my Department under the review of public service allowances and premium pay. Departments were notified in September 2012 of details of the Government decision regarding the outcome of the review. Approval for payment of an allowance to a new beneficiary pending the outcome of the review was withdrawn from 31 January 2012 and was not restored where the review found there was no business case for its payment to new beneficiaries.

Following the review, sectoral management were instructed to engage with staff interests with a view to securing their early agreement to the elimination of those departmental allowances payable to current beneficiaries where no business case exists to pay those allowances to new beneficiaries, with a list identified for consideration among the allowances they should prioritise for early elimination. In addition, Departments have been asked to identify other allowances, including legacy allowances, for elimination. Departments are directly engaging with staff representatives on the allowances specific to their areas.

Labour Court Recommendation No. LCR20448 has implications for the decision. In particular, the court recommended that "the parties should enter into central negotiations with a view to reaching a generally applicable agreement on measures by which loss arising from the elimination of pensionable allowances can be ameliorated". My Department is working on proposals on this to put to the staff side. The Haddington Road agreement provides, and the unions have agreed, that there will be full co-operation with the allowances review, taking account of the recommendations contained in Labour Court Recommendation No. LCR20448, and the outcome of the review will, therefore, require agreement at sectoral level.

In cases where no agreement can be reached, the time-bound mechanism for dispute resolution through existing industrial relations systems, the Labour Court, conciliation and arbitration schemes or the Public Service Stability Agreement 2013-2016, the Haddington Road agreement, is available. Given that many allowances have been discontinued for new appointees to posts, the precise number of allowances discontinued and, consequently, the number in place, is dependent on rates of staff turnover across the public service, and I do not have that figure.

Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister. Perhaps when he has the figure of the allowances that have been discontinued for new entrants he might send it to us. Could he give us the list of the allowances? It might not affect the number because with the recent recruitment situation an allowance might have been discontinued but there might have been no new entrant in that area yet. I am concerned that it seems to be going around the house a little. The Labour Court wants a central agreement while the essence of the Haddington Road agreement was sectoral agreements.

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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That is right.

Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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There is a conflict and a mechanism to slow it up. The Minister caused a brouhaha with his unrealistic announcement of €75 million in savings that was to be achieved by this. Once he drilled into it, he saw that some of the allowances were excellent value for money, were part of core pay in effect but were given through a variety of mechanisms. It would be good for the public service to rationalise them so there is not an impression that old, outdated allowances are being paid. It would be good to tidy this up.

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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I agree with the Deputy. My first budget announcement was that we could realistically target 5%, and that is where the figure of €75 million came from.

The Deputy was on the committee which examined allowances and he knows that when we drill down to see what are allowances, this is a completely different issue. I do not have time to go into detail with the Deputy but within the different classes of allowances, some could only be described as core pay, some are formally agreed with binding decisions of the Labour Court and pay agreements to be integrated as part of pay, while others are outdated or no longer of value. That is what we are working on.

The allowances issue was subsumed into the Haddington Road agreement. The €75 million becomes small beer when we speak in terms of the €1 billion agreement I managed to achieve with unions to change the system fundamentally and allow for real and meaningful Exchequer savings to be made, with flexibility to be agreed with unions to restructure the public service within the reform plan laid out.

Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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I accept the Minister saying that this is small in an overall context but it would be useful for the public service - I speak in the interests of public servants - not to have any old allowances which cannot be justified in a business case today. If some of them have to be bought out, long-established mechanisms in the public service can be used and we should do that and get it over with. Perhaps there is a cashflow issue that must be dealt with.

I was particularly impressed by one allowance when I heard of it at the Committee of Public Accounts. It is an allowance of €5,000 per annum paid to Garda inspectors who process all the prosecutions in District Courts around the country. A senior counsel could not be engaged for a day and a half for that fee but these people would be on their feet at District Courts every week of the year, processing thousands of cases. Some allowances are very well earned and amount to outstanding value for money, so it would be good to see some of them incorporated into core pay.

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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The largest category of allowances form a significant element of the overall taxable and pensionable remuneration of staff, especially in the groups of which we are aware, including gardaí, firefighters, prison officers, the Defence Forces and teachers. It is neither practical nor reasonable to take away unilaterally a big chunk of somebody's income. That is the long and short of it. These are by far the biggest volume of allowances in money terms.

The second category is made up of payments which do not form a significant element of remuneration but are important to people on call or where they work unsocial hours. It also applies in the Deputy's example. We need to examine each sector separately, and there is now a review of An Garda Síochána. Maybe the particular role mentioned should be a defined office with a pay grade appropriate which is above the normal office. It is a matter for each sector to consider. As I believe the Deputy discovered in the Committee of Public Accounts debate, these are quite complex issues.