Emmet Stagg (Kildare North, Labour)
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Question 742: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government if his attention has been drawn to the serious anomaly in the ratio of local authority staff to population in Counties Kildare and Meath in the Great Dublin Area which respectively have one local authority staff member for every 200 people in County Kildare and one local authority staff member for every 215 people in County Meath; his views on whether these counties saw the largest growth in population in the State between 1996 and 2002 at 21.4 per cent and 22.1 per cent respectively compared to the State growth in population of 8 per cent; if his attention has further been drawn to the fact that in counties such as Kerry there is a local authority staff member for every 124 people, Cavan a local authority staff member for 124 people, Clare a local authority staff member for every 123 people; his views on whether the pressures of population growth in County Kildare and County Meath require him to lift the public service recruitment embargo in these local authority areas in view of the demands from the public for services; and if he will discuss this matter with the Department of Finance. [27424/06]

Dick Roche (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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Under Section 159 of the Local Government Act 2001, it is a matter for the manager of each local authority to make such staffing and organisational arrangements as may be necessary for the purposes of carrying out the functions of the local authorities for which he/she is responsible. However, managers must have regard to Government policy on the control and regulation of numbers in the public sector, including local authorities, which was announced in the Minister for Finance's Budget statement of 7 December 2005. Local authority staffing overall increased by over 25% in the period 1997 to 2003, and there were significantly higher percentage increases in Kildare and Meath County Council staffing levels over the same period. I am keeping the overall position in the local government sector under regular review, in consultation with the Minister for Finance.