Tom Parlon (Laois-Offaly, Progressive Democrats)

I attempted to correct the Senator but I should not interfere. It was never intended to move a whole Department en bloc to a particular location. There is a high degree of inflexibility within the Civil Service at present such that people have to crisscross for miles because they are not allowed to move, resulting in a quality of life deficit. The main reason for this is that the public service unions that represent them do not allow flexibility. This is a difficulty.

There is a high degree of interest in decentralisation. Senator John Paul Phelan said a number of people from regional locations were applying to the central applications facility. Civil servants who work in Kilkenny, Portlaoise, Castlebar or elsewhere have the same rights and entitlements as anyone else. If the Senator is suggesting Fine Gael would have proposed a scheme that would have allowed decentralisation from Dublin but would not have allowed the movement of civil servants who had previously applied for decentralisation, he is being ridiculous. It would not work.