Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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1. To ask the Taoiseach his plans to update his Department's statement of strategy. [29971/17]

Gerry Adams (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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2. To ask the Taoiseach if he plans to update his Department's strategy statement 2016-2019. [31238/17]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 1 and 2 together.

In accordance with the Public Service Management Act 1997 a new three-year statement of strategy will be prepared by my Department within six months. The current Statement of Strategy 2016 - 2019 reflects the role of the Department which is, to support the Taoiseach and the Government, to develop a sustainable economy and a successful society, to pursue Ireland’s interests abroad, to implement the programme for Government and to build a better future for Ireland and all her citizens.

The strategy statement is aligned to the Government’s key priorities and policies and it sets out the following six strategic priorities: providing excellent support services for the Taoiseach and Government; ensuring Ireland has sustainable economy; helping to ensure that Government policies and services support a socially inclusive and fair society; ensuring that Ireland maintains strong relationships in Europe and the World; ensuring the best possible outcomes for Ireland in relation to Brexit - this, of course, includes protecting the common travel area and the peace process; and planning for the future in the context of all of the many uncertainties arising in the international environment. I have already set out to the House a number priorities across Government, including meeting the challenges of Brexit and managing the evolving relationships across Europe and on these Islands.

It is also vital that Ireland’s public finances remain on a firm footing as preparations continue for Budget 2018 and a new capital infrastructure plan for Ireland is finalised. Protecting Ireland’s growing economy is critical to ensuring Ireland is an equal society, creating equal opportunities for all its people to participate and share in our prosperity.

The new statement of strategy will draw from these areas and outline the priorities to guide the work of my Department for the coming three years. Following its submission to Government, the strategy will be published and laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas.

Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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I thank the Taoiseach for his reply. The current Department of the Taoiseach strategy statement was only published in February. The Taoiseach indicated the areas which are encompassed by it. What I would like to know now is what changes, in general terms, he intends to bring about in advance of the publication of the formal document.

The Taoiseach has indicated a number of changes that he wants to bring about in the Government. He has moved responsibility for Brexit to the Minister and Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and he has also appointed an additional super junior Minister. Yesterday, the Taoiseach said that he has reduced the number of Cabinet committees and that he wants a special focus on health. In regard to the revised strategy statement, does the Taoiseach intend to retain the six strategic priorities identified by his predecessor, including planning for the future, Brexit, strong relationships with Europe and the world, a better society, a sustainable economy and support the Taoiseach and Government? Does the Taoiseach intend to broaden those priorities and will there be a particular strategic focus on health?

The Taoiseach also mentioned the need for investment in infrastructure. Will there be a particular emphasis on infrastructure in the new strategy statement? In terms of the structure of Government, a considerable amount of time has passed since I wrote to the Taoiseach on the issue of the remuneration packages for the Ministers of State who attend at Cabinet. Has the Taoiseach received advice from the Attorney General on that matter - it is not complicated - and what is his intention in that regard?

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I have not received the advice yet but I also have not followed up on the matter. I will do that because I would like the matter concluded before the House rises. A new strategy statement is required because the Public Service Management Act requires that any time there is a change of Taoiseach or a change of Minister in any Department a new strategy statement must be produced within six months. I am not necessarily sure that it is a good idea that every time there is a change of Minister or a reshuffle a new strategy statement must be produced. I believe the current strategy statement is quite good. It sets out the six over-arching areas that the Department of the Taoiseach is committed to dealing with. I do not plan to deepen it in sectoral terms. We have a programme for Government and I do not think it is necessary to have different sectoral policies in the new strategy statement.

I have not seen the draft of the new strategy statement: it may not be prepared yet. I do not plan it to be a major departure from the strategy that exists already.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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I take the Taoiseach's point in terms of the changing of strategy statements because what is needed is sustained focus to deliver change. What is necessary also is a strategy statement that amounts to more than aspiration and that moves beyond rhetoric. The Taoiseach mentioned a better Ireland. That is fantastic. We can all sign up for that. The issue is whether Government and the Office of An Taoiseach has the grit and the imagination to make that happen. As is often said, to make an omelette one has to break some eggs. To make Ireland better will require more than breaking eggs, it will require considerable effort and focus.

In regard to the reference in the strategy to the need to devote time and resources to planning for the future, funding and reform of the health service, it is disappointing that the Minister for Health, Deputy Harris, has indicated that he will, in a piecemeal way, adopt the report produced by the all-party Committee on the future of Healthcare. The crisis in the service is evident. The waiting lists are soaring, exhausted staff are fleeing the services in their droves, it seems and there is a lack of capacity in the Ambulance Service. The figures from the INMO reveal that in the first months of this year hospitals recorded the highest levels of overcrowding since record keeping commenced. I know that the Taoiseach can and will cite the exceptions but that is shocking. What does he, as Taoiseach, a former Minister for Health and a medical professional, propose to do about this?

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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As Taoiseach, I am head of the Government and it is my responsibility to drive the implementation of the programme for Government. The programme for Government includes an extensive section on health. It is my responsibility to work with the Minister for Health, Deputy Harris, and the Minister for Finance, Deputy Donohoe, to ensure that it is implemented and that is exactly what I intend to do.

In terms of the Sláintecare report, the Minister, Deputy Harris, has been tasked with providing a reasoned response to it. That should be done by September or October. Proper costings and due diligence need to be done. Having read the report, it seems to be silent or open on a funding model. It does not propose a particular new funding model. It just suggests that the health service should be funded from a number of sources, some of which it is already funded by.

The Deputy mentioned the trolley numbers for the first six months of this year, which once again demonstrate the enormity and scale of the challenge ahead of us to turn our health service around and do that in a sustainable way. I had a very useful meeting with the Minister, Deputy Harris, and the Secretary General of his Department last week, and we are going to try to develop some plans to turn things around. However, what is often interesting in these matters is not the exceptions but the stark contrasts in performance from hospital to hospital, to which the Deputy drew attention. These are figures produced by the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation which show that, for example, in Beaumont Hospital the number of people on trolleys is at its lowest since records began. The same applies to Connolly Hospital in Blanchardstown and St. Vincent's Hospital has the second lowest number. We need to ask the fundamental question: why is there such an enormous variation in performance? One of the worst performing hospitals, for example, very disappointingly, is St. Luke's in Kilkenny, which has a new emergency department and many additional staff, yet Beaumont Hospital, which has had no extra beds or staff and is serving an ageing population, has had its best performance in ten years. Connolly Hospital, my local hospital, which is located in an area with a rapidly expanding population, has had the lowest trolley numbers since the nurses started counting them. That tells us a story about the health service. The constant solution that has been put forward is that it is all about putting more staff and more resources into the same system, but clearly that is only one part of the solution, because we see demonstrably that good management-----

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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The Taoiseach has no answer for me.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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-----and clinical leadership make a huge change.

Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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During last week's Taoiseach's Questions, the Taoiseach said he was still looking around the Taoiseach's Department in terms of policy advisers and so on and that he would take his time to decide how to change things there, and the same was suggested regarding Cabinet committees. How long does he believe that process will take in terms of the Cabinet committees and the restructuring of the Department?

As the Taoiseach said, the current statement of strategy was published in February. It is interesting that it promised a full human resource analysis by the end of the following month. Four months on, can the Taoiseach tell us if this has been done and what actions, if any, have been implemented to make sure that there is enough staffing in critical roles within his Department? The outgoing strategy promised a full human resource analysis. It also lists six priority areas for the Department's work. Surprisingly one of them is not work concerning Northern Ireland. It is arguable, and we have argued that over the past six years, that the disengagement ofthe Taoiseach, and his predecessor and Ministers, from Northern Ireland has been extremely damaging to the process. Certainly there have been concerns as to whether to the Taoiseach's office has the capacity any more to take the leadership role which previous taoisigh took in regard to the Good Friday Agreement. There was a point, for example, where the Northern division was a separate division in the Taoiseach's Department, it is now a section of a larger division which is dominated by Brexit and European Union matters. In terms of the new strategy, will the Taoiseach consider restoring the status and priority given to Northern Ireland in his Department? What measures does he propose to take to reverse the drift of recent years? It seems the template that is the Good Friday Agreement must remain the fundamental evolutionary framework for the three sets of relationship between Britain and Ireland, the North and the South and within both communities. I think there is an attempt by a number of forces and groups, by pushing other agendas, to undermine the essence of the Good Friday Agreement, which is the template to have proper parity of esteem between both communities in the North and the traditions and various issues that relate to those traditions.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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The Cabinet this morning approved the establishment of new Cabinet committees. There will be five Cabinet committees, lettered A, B, C, D and E, one covering broadly economic policy; one covering broadly public services and social policy, one dealing with Brexit and European affairs, one dealing principally with infrastructure and housing and a fifth one dealing principally with health. We are going to see how that works for six months and then make changes at that point if any need to be made.

I had a chance to meet all the staff in the Department yesterday, albeit briefly but individually, to see what they do in their different areas. The Department of the Taoiseach is quite a small one and only 100 or so people work in it. People may imagine that the Department that co-ordinates matters and runs Government is much bigger than it really is. We will need to consider in the time ahead which areas need to be beefed up and perhaps Northern Ireland is one of those areas.

I very much agree with the Deputy that the Good Friday Agreement is and should remain the framework by which we manage relations in Northern Ireland, both North and South and east and west. It was agreed and passed in a referendum in this Republic by 97% of the people and in Northern Ireland by 71% of the people. It is not just a 50% plus one mandate, it is a set of relationships that have been agreed in both parts of the island by big majorities and by both communities. I do not believe there should be any significant change in the constitutional status or constitutional arrangements in Northern Ireland unless there is a degree of support from both communities.

Pat Gallagher (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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I call Deputy Boyd Barrett. I point out that we are encroaching on the time for questions. Therefore, I ask the Deputy to brief.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Sure. Will the new strategy statement acknowledge the disastrous failure of the housing strategy pursued during the past six years? That is not a rhetorical use of the word "disastrous". It is a self-evident fact that the strategy that has been pursued has failed to an extraordinary level. It has resulted in almost 3,000 people being homeless and 7,000 people in total, an enormous number, rotting on housing lists for close to two decades, in some cases, and there is no sign of any of this improving. It would be refreshing for anybody in politics and certainly for a Government to acknowledge a mistake, to say we got it wrong and that we need to radically shift focus and strategy in this area and, in particular, to recognise that the plan to lure in real estate investment trusts, vulture funds, property speculators and developers, through various incentives and tax breaks, has been an utter failure. I do not think we will ever grasp the extent to which it has been a failure in terms of the taxes forgone, but there can be little doubt of the enormous amount of money that has been made by those people. If we consider the results in terms of housing delivery, there was a 0.4% increase in the quantum of housing during those years and the situation has been disastrous in terms of housing and the homelessness. Will there be a recognition of that in the strategy statement and a consideration of a radical shift in strategy towards public provision of housing?

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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The strategy statement will be a strategy statement for the Department of the Taoiseach. As there is a new Minister in the Custom House, there will also need to be a new strategy statement for the Department of Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government. I imagine that will be the statement which will deal with and answer some of the questions the Deputy has raised. The Rebuilding Ireland strategy is Government policy. It is being implemented. As the Deputy will know, approximately 2,000 social houses are at various stages of construction or planning. That is a significant change compared to where were last year and we know that planning starts and planning applications have increased considerable as well. We are seeing definite increased activity in terms of housing supply, but we are still obviously very much further behind where we need to be in terms of supply. The Minister, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, is reviewing the strategy in full. Part of it, as the Deputy will know, involves an increase by one third in our social housing stock. Perhaps that is not enough but it is significant that we are going to increase our social housing stock by one third. It is a reversal of the policy in the past which was to reduce the social housing stock and sell it off. We are committed in the plan to increase it considerably but other measures need to be examined as well. There is a review of the first-time buyer's grant, of which the Deputy will be aware. Consideration is being given to a vacant homes strategy and taking action to tax homes that have been vacant for long periods of time in places of high demand, or also incentivising and encouraging people to make homes available for habitation.

In the context of the budget, we will need to look at the private rented sector to see if there are ways we can encourage people to continue to rent their properties or move into the private rental market if they are not doing so already.