Seán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade if he will outline the opportunities that persons in lower grades of the Public Service have been afforded ion contributing to the reforms of the public service as sought in the Public Service Agreement; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [50643/12]

Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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The Public Service Agreement, 2010-2014 (the “Croke Park” Agreement) provides a framework for public service management and staff to work together to reduce the cost of delivery of public services while also maintaining or improving the quality of those services. While Departmental Action Plans are a management responsibility, staff in all grades have been invited to input suggestions into the formulation of my Department’s approach to implementation of the Agreement and have been consulted on an ongoing basis on the plans, progress and savings reports which have been submitted to the Croke Park Implementation Body. These important matters are the subject of regular and detailed discussions between Departmental management and staff representatives.

I greatly appreciate the contribution made by the staff of my Department to the design and delivery of the ongoing reforms in our business processes which have yielded substantial and sustained savings in administrative running costs. These reforms are contributing to the effort to meet the challenge of maintaining the range, quality and geographic scope of the policy, programme management, promotional and frontline citizen services provided by the Department with the substantially reduced resources available.