Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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Question 90: To ask the Minister for Finance if he accepts the recommendations of the Special Group on Public Service Numbers and Expenditure Programmes in respect of supply chain management in the public service; if he has acted on these recommendations; the savings that have been achieved as a result; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [27090/10]

Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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I am aware of the Group's recommendation in this regard and, like the rest of the Group's recommendations, where not acted upon yet, these are subject to ongoing consideration at Government in the context of the annual preparations for the Budget. The Government has already acted to set up the National Procurement Service and has achieved some important savings in this respect. The Group's Report will serve to guide us on the next steps to take in securing further value for the State.

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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Question 91: To ask the Minister for Finance if he accepts the recommendations of the Special Group on Public Service Numbers and Expenditure Programmes in respect of the sharing of information and communications technology services in the public service; if he has acted on these recommendations; the savings that have been achieved as a result; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [27091/10]

Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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My Department worked with the Special Group on the development of its recommendations for shared ICT services. These recommendations are far-reaching and ambitious. The Special Group recognised that greater sharing would have to be commensurate with improvements in the skills and knowledge of ICT staff. Consequently, the recommendations will take considerable time and effort to implement and generate savings. Accordingly, the Cabinet Committee on Transforming the Public Service has instructed all Departments and Offices to examine how they can enhance internal ICT capabilities and to develop ICT staffing plans in accordance with the Special Group's recommendations in this regard. This work is underway.

It's worth noting that a good number of shared ICT approaches and services are already underway. Examples include the nationwide Government Networks, the shared integrated digital radio solution for the emergency and security services of the State, the Civil Service's HR Management System, the Local Authority Payroll and HR Management System, the Death Event Publication Service, a central ePayments solution (in the Local Government Computer Services Board), digital certificate authentication services (in Revenue), and framework procurements for a range of ICT commodities and telecommunications services, etc.

In addition, a number of the largest data centre operators (such as Revenue, Agriculture and the Local Government Computer Services Board) have made their data centre facilities available to other public bodies in accordance with the Special Group's recommendations in this regard. For example, the Revenue Commissioners have already taken systems from 6 other public bodies into its data centre and is in the process of evaluating systems from 7 more.

Late last year, my Department embarked on an extensive research programme with a number of multinational hardware and software vendors to work out the best architectural and value for money approaches for Government use of cloud computing. This next generation of computing models, which has sharing and multi-tenancy at its core, has the potential to consolidate hardware and software usage through "Infrastructure as a Service" and "Software as a Service" delivery. If this research can identify approaches that are appropriate to the public service and are sustainable over time, it will fundamentally change the nature of ICT services delivery in the public service in the coming years and will facilitate the delivery of the additional shared ICT services detailed in the Special Group's recommendations.