John O'Donoghue (Kerry South, Fianna Fail)
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Question 422: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government the proposals he has to ensure that representations made by Members of the Oireachtas on behalf of members of the public to his Department are responded to; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [26902/10]

John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)
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My Department's Customer Service Action Plan 2009-2011 commits to ensuring that timely and accurate responses are given to all requests for information received by my Department. Individual standards for dealing with telephone callers, personal callers and correspondents are set out in the Customer Charter. With regard to written contact with my Department (either by letter or email), which would include representations made by Members of the Oireachtas on behalf of members of the public, my Department aims to respond to all queries in clear plain language within 15 working days.

Since 2007, the E-Reps system has been used to allow Departmental staff to deal with representations electronically. A representation is processed electronically from the time it is entered on the system until the final reply is printed for signing by either the relevant Minister or Private Secretary. As with all written correspondence received by the Department, the E-Reps system aims to ensure that Ministerial representations are responded to within 15 days.

Representations were affected by industrial action by the PSEU and CPSU across all Departments, including my Department. In the light of the ICTU Public Services Committee acceptance of the Public Service Agreement 2010-2014, I expect that representations can now be addressed in accordance with the targets in the Customer Charter.