Brendan Ryan (Labour)

That is not what this is about. The CSO has been an extraordinarily successful transfer because it is an integrated body, most of whose work is done within the body. What use will the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources and the Minister be in County Cavan, travelling in droves up and down to Dublin each time an Oireachtas committee wants to meet them or the Minister wants to come to Dublin, etc? It is a spurious idea.

If the Government wants to decentralise power, it should strengthen local government, which it has resolutely refused to do, choosing instead to engage in a token exercise which most people know will not work. The Department also knows it will not work because the Department of Finance will not put a figure on the cost. Has anybody ever heard of the Department of Finance supporting a project for which it did not know the cost, in this case the costs associated with civil servants commuting between various parts of the country and of having essentially two senior staffs in each Department, with a Secretary General in Dublin and another in Cork, Cavan or elsewhere? To ensure the system does not fall apart, parallel administrations will be required in Dublin and the region in question.

One could argue about the merits of decentralising some of the agencies selected. The fundamental thrust of the proposal, the movement of the headquarters of Departments, is profoundly bad for public administration but good for the image of the Fianna Fáil Party as we approach local elections in which it will receive a hammering. The party hopes the decentralisation announcement will bail it out in a few specific cases.