Lucinda Creighton (Dublin South East, Fine Gael)
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Question 435: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the annual costs incurred by her Department in the implementation of the decentralisation scheme for each of the past four years, broken down between property and non-property costs; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [35559/08]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Since the commencement of the decentralisation programme in the Department, expenditure returns have been submitted to the Department of Finance detailing non-property costs associated with the programme for both this Department and the agencies under its aegis. The Department has not incurred any property costs as these are a matter for the Office of Public Works. The following tabular statement summarises the expenditure returns in respect of non-property costs for the period up to the end of September 2008.

Lucinda Creighton (Dublin South East, Fine Gael)
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Question 436: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the progress made by her Department on implementing the decentralisation scheme, including the number of staff who have moved under the scheme and the property bought or rented outside Dublin under the scheme; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [35574/08]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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Under the Government's current decentralisation programme for the civil and public service, some 1,200 posts comprising the Department's headquarter sections and the Social Welfare Appeals Office are relocating to 6 locations — Sligo, Carrick-on-Shannon, Donegal Town, Buncrana, Carrickmacross and Drogheda.

To date, 211 posts have relocated from the Department's Dublin Offices to Sligo and Carrick-on-Shannon — 72 posts to Sligo and 139 posts to Carrick-on-Shannon. An extension to the Department's existing Office in Sligo, for the decentralisation programme to that location, was completed in 2006. The Office of Public Works (OPW) has leased a building in Carrick-on-Shannon for this Department's decentralisation programme and staff assignments commenced mid-2007.

The Government outlined in Budget 2009 that the decentralisation programme to Buncrana and Drogheda would proceed as planned. A site in Buncrana has been purchased, the building is under construction and the expected completion date of the project is late 2009. The OPW has purchased sites in Drogheda to accommodate the Department's Headquarters and the Social Welfare Appeals Office.

The Department already have decentralised offices in Longford, Sligo, Letterkenny, Waterford, Dundalk and Roscommon and some 219 employees have transferred to these offices and other offices of the Department to fill vacancies created by the current decentralisation programme. Furthermore, a total of 258 employees of the Department have transferred to other Government Departments for the purposes of their decentralisation programmes.

As outlined in Budget 2009, the Government has reviewed the Decentralisation Programme in light of the changed economic circumstances and the deterioration in public finances. The remaining elements of the programme for this Department have been deferred pending a review in 2011 in light of the budgetary developments.