Results 161-180 of 186 for speaker:Shay Brennan

Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Estimates for Public Services 2025
Vote 11 - Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (Revised)
Vote 12 - Superannuation and Retired Allowances (Revised)
Vote 14 - State Laboratory (Revised)
Vote 15 - Secret Service (Revised)
Vote 17 - Public Appointments Service (Revised)
Vote 18 - National Shared Services Office (Revised)
Vote 19 - Office of the Ombudsman (Revised)
Vote 39 - Office of Government Procurement (Revised)
Vote 43 - Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (Revised) (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: I thank the Minister and Minister of State for attending and for their preparation and statements, and I extend the same to their departmental colleagues. My first question is for the Minister of State, Deputy Higgins. With regard to Vote 39 and Vote 43, which concern Government procurement and IT services, why are the costs of these not charged back to the relevant Departments?

Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Estimates for Public Services 2025
Vote 11 - Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (Revised)
Vote 12 - Superannuation and Retired Allowances (Revised)
Vote 14 - State Laboratory (Revised)
Vote 15 - Secret Service (Revised)
Vote 17 - Public Appointments Service (Revised)
Vote 18 - National Shared Services Office (Revised)
Vote 19 - Office of the Ombudsman (Revised)
Vote 39 - Office of Government Procurement (Revised)
Vote 43 - Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (Revised) (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: I have a question on a similar topic for the Minister, Deputy Chambers. Vote 18 is on the National Shared Services Office and most of it does not seem to be charged back but the HR section does appear to be charged back. What is the consideration behind that?

Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Estimates for Public Services 2025
Vote 11 - Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (Revised)
Vote 12 - Superannuation and Retired Allowances (Revised)
Vote 14 - State Laboratory (Revised)
Vote 15 - Secret Service (Revised)
Vote 17 - Public Appointments Service (Revised)
Vote 18 - National Shared Services Office (Revised)
Vote 19 - Office of the Ombudsman (Revised)
Vote 39 - Office of Government Procurement (Revised)
Vote 43 - Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (Revised) (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: On the same Vote, Deputy Nash mentioned robotics here. I am curious what that actually means. Is that mechanical robotics being used to pack envelopes, etc? If so, then why is there not a similar line for processes automated by software or AI?

Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Estimates for Public Services 2025
Vote 11 - Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (Revised)
Vote 12 - Superannuation and Retired Allowances (Revised)
Vote 14 - State Laboratory (Revised)
Vote 15 - Secret Service (Revised)
Vote 17 - Public Appointments Service (Revised)
Vote 18 - National Shared Services Office (Revised)
Vote 19 - Office of the Ombudsman (Revised)
Vote 39 - Office of Government Procurement (Revised)
Vote 43 - Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (Revised) (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: That makes sense. I presume there is nothing that the Minister can tell us about Vote 15. My only comment is that I have been doing these Revised Estimates in committee for a couple of weeks now and I know everything else goes up year on year but the allocation for this Vote has not gone up year on year.

Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Estimates for Public Services 2025
Vote 11 - Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (Revised)
Vote 12 - Superannuation and Retired Allowances (Revised)
Vote 14 - State Laboratory (Revised)
Vote 15 - Secret Service (Revised)
Vote 17 - Public Appointments Service (Revised)
Vote 18 - National Shared Services Office (Revised)
Vote 19 - Office of the Ombudsman (Revised)
Vote 39 - Office of Government Procurement (Revised)
Vote 43 - Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (Revised) (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: Is there anything else the Minister wants to tell us about secret service? Okay. Vote 11 is the main one and we can see that the number of public service employees rose steadily. The latest confirmed figure in the Revised Estimates 2023 is 397,000 employees. Does the Minister have projections for this over the coming years?

Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Estimates for Public Services 2025
Vote 11 - Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (Revised)
Vote 12 - Superannuation and Retired Allowances (Revised)
Vote 14 - State Laboratory (Revised)
Vote 15 - Secret Service (Revised)
Vote 17 - Public Appointments Service (Revised)
Vote 18 - National Shared Services Office (Revised)
Vote 19 - Office of the Ombudsman (Revised)
Vote 39 - Office of Government Procurement (Revised)
Vote 43 - Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (Revised) (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: The broad composition of capital expenditure is split between economic and social. I see that is reasonably steady over the past three years reported. Is that a policy target?

Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Estimates for Public Services 2025
Vote 11 - Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (Revised)
Vote 12 - Superannuation and Retired Allowances (Revised)
Vote 14 - State Laboratory (Revised)
Vote 15 - Secret Service (Revised)
Vote 17 - Public Appointments Service (Revised)
Vote 18 - National Shared Services Office (Revised)
Vote 19 - Office of the Ombudsman (Revised)
Vote 39 - Office of Government Procurement (Revised)
Vote 43 - Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (Revised) (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: I have a brief final question.

Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Estimates for Public Services 2025
Vote 11 - Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (Revised)
Vote 12 - Superannuation and Retired Allowances (Revised)
Vote 14 - State Laboratory (Revised)
Vote 15 - Secret Service (Revised)
Vote 17 - Public Appointments Service (Revised)
Vote 18 - National Shared Services Office (Revised)
Vote 19 - Office of the Ombudsman (Revised)
Vote 39 - Office of Government Procurement (Revised)
Vote 43 - Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (Revised) (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: The World Bank aggregate indicator of Government effectiveness has a 94th percentile. That seems pretty good. What is that measuring the effectiveness of?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Engagement with Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: I thank the Minister and the Minister of State. I have only three or four questions. They are focused on the new infrastructure division within the Department. It is a move I very much welcome. In light of ongoing, or recent anyway, value-for-money concerns, what measures are the Department and the division taking to ensure public spending remains within the agreed ceilings? I am...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Engagement with Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: The Minister mentioned the industry experts who are being seconded to the division. What is the selection process? What mechanism is in place to ensure they have the correct expertise for this role?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Engagement with Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: The individuals who have been seconded to the infrastructure division. My understanding is they are coming from the likes of State agencies such as Uisce Éireann. What mechanism is in place to ensure their expertise is effectively integrated into the Department? How were these individuals selected in the first place? Are they headhunted or is there an application process or a list of...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Engagement with Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: The final question relates to capital. Given Ireland's comparatively low debt-to-GDP ratio, even the adjusted one, we have plenty of headroom to borrow to front-load infrastructure. That is a prudent thing to do given we need the infrastructure now to close up the deficit and given how, if correctly applied, this infrastructure should more than repay the Exchequer over time. I am wondering...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach: Engagement with Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation (25 Jun 2025)

Shay Brennan: Going back to value for money, I might draw on a project in my constituency to illustrate this, but I am making a broader point. I have referred to it in the infrastructure committee also. It has been much debated over the past decade that the Luas green line needs to be upgraded to a full metro. The infrastructure is there to do it. The underlying system was built to take an upgrade to a...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade: General Scheme of Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Importation of Goods) Bill 2025 (1 Jul 2025)

Shay Brennan: I thank the witnesses for attending and for being forthright in their answers. Much of the discussion has been about the inclusion of services and the potential for including services in the final Bill. From a personal point of view, I sincerely hope we can find a way to include services, but we are on a tight timeline. The answer given regarding the Attorney General providing an opinion...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade: General Scheme of Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Importation of Goods) Bill 2025 (1 Jul 2025)

Shay Brennan: Okay. There is no way to get any further information as to-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade: General Scheme of Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Importation of Goods) Bill 2025 (1 Jul 2025)

Shay Brennan: I am not talking about the actual advice or the outcome. I am just talking about when that will be delivered.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade: General Scheme of Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Importation of Goods) Bill 2025 (1 Jul 2025)

Shay Brennan: It could come any day. In preparing the Bill, is the Department preparing for a situation that would also include services, again, in light of the tight timeframe?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade: General Scheme of Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Importation of Goods) Bill 2025 (1 Jul 2025)

Shay Brennan: Okay. More broadly on timing around the final implementation of this, it seems a lot of contingencies are coming from elsewhere that are out of the hands of the Department. Is there any sense of pressure within the Department to try to get this done in this session?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade: General Scheme of Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Importation of Goods) Bill 2025 (1 Jul 2025)

Shay Brennan: It was mentioned that the Department had been in contact with some other states, or they had reached out to it. Will the officials shed any light on what states are closest to or most likely to follow us should we get this Bill enacted?