Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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611. To ask the Minister for Defence if he will provide in tabular form year on year the number of commercial and non-commercial State agency board positions, under the aegis of his Department that have been filled since March 2011 to December 2013; the number of these positions that were publically advertised; and the number of female appointments. [1373/14]

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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The State Boards under the aegis of the Department of Defence when the Government took office were the Civil Defence Board, the Army Pensions Board and the Board of Coiste an Asgard.

The number of board positions filled and the gender breakdown for the period March 2011 to 31 December 2013 is set out in the table below.

The Civil Defence Board was established in 2003. It was identified in the Public Service Reform Plan as a body to be abolished. I appointed an interim Board as a temporary measure in 2011 and in this context none of the positions were advertised. Legislation to dissolve the Board was passed by the Oireachtas in December 2012. Its functions have now transferred back to the Department of Defence.

The Army Pensions Board comprises 3 members: a chairman, a civilian medical doctor and an officer of the Army Medical Corps. There have been two appointments to the Army Pensions Board since March 2011. A male officer was appointed to the position of Army Medical Corps member of the Board in December 2011 and a female civilian doctor was appointed as ordinary member in November 2013. The civilian doctor vacancy was advertised on my Department’s website and the Public Appointments Service website.

There have been no appointments to the Board of Coiste an Asgard since 2009. In the context of settling the Estimates for the Department of Defence for 2010, the Government decided that the national sail training scheme operated by Coiste an Asgard would be discontinued as recommended in the Report of the Special Group on Public Service Numbers and Expenditure. The formal wind up of the Company including voluntary strike off with the Companies Registration Office was completed in early 2013.