Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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Question 154: To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the benefits which accrued from benchmarking with regard to the services provided to the general public by her Department. [40870/08]

Mary Coughlan (Donegal South West, Fianna Fail)
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The first Public Service Benchmarking Body was established as an independent body in July 2000 under the terms of the Programme for Prosperity and Fairness to examine public service pay and jobs by comparison with the private sector. The Body reported in June 2002 and recommended varying levels of pay increases for the grades examined. The Benchmarking Body, in their first report, recommended that, apart from the first quarter of the award, the payment of the balance should be dependent on real and verifiable outputs from modernisation, flexibility and change. This was endorsed by the social partners in Sustaining Progress. It was also agreed that the final two phases of the benchmarking increases should be conditional on satisfactory implementation of the modernisation agenda and the maintenance of industrial relations stability.

The change agenda as set out in Sustaining Progress and subsequent action plans reflected the priorities of the various sectors. The Towards 2016 Agreement built on the progress made under previous partnership agreements and reaffirmed commitment to the further development and accelerated implementation of modernisation frameworks in each sector of the public service in order to secure the flexibility required to achieve the highest international standards. It provides an important framework for meeting the economic and social challenges ahead and builds on previous achievements in areas such as:

more responsive and better quality customer services;

better management of performance — individually and organisationally;

better financial and human resource management;

greater flexibility and openness to change.

Critically, Towards 2016 sets out a mechanism for the verification of progress at sectoral, organisational and grade level in the civil service through the establishment of Civil Service Performance Verification Groups. Under the terms of the agreement, the CSPVG is required to satisfy itself on progress in relation to co-operation with flexibility and ongoing change, including co-operation with the satisfactory implementation of the agenda for modernisation set out in the agreement, the maintenance of stable industrial relations and the absence of industrial action in respect of any matters covered by the agreement before recommending the pay increases provided for under the agreement.

My Department is responsible for the development and delivery of a wide range of customer-oriented policy initiatives and services, and all of the improvements made in these areas in recent years are listed in the Actions Plans and Progress Reports that were submitted to the CSPVG under the Partnership Agreements. Copies of the Reports and of the CSPVG responses in respect of my Department are available on their website at www.cspvg.gov.ie.

The benefits arising to my Department from the benchmarking and associated Partnership processes are detailed in those reports. In general, though, they include the development of a more performance-oriented culture, an improved focus on accountability with closely defined responsibilities, and a better use of ICT with the development of a wider and more customer-oriented range of on-line services.

More specific achievements in this area by my Department include:

improved customer service through online publication of the Patents Office Official Journal which provides better public access to specialised information concerning intellectual property rights in Ireland

the creation of a central repository of legislation, briefing material and information on employment rights legislation in order to create a single, searchable repository of all such legislation

the establishment of the National Employment Rights Authority (NERA)

meeting targets (90%) for the number of suppliers being paid by Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT), and

achieving all specific targets identified in our external Customer Charter.