Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein)
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143. To ask the Minister for Health if he will provide in tabular form the percentage of vacant positions on State boards under the aegis of his Department that were filled from the panels created through open application by the Public Appointments Service by year from to 2011 to date in 2014. [37491/14]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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The nomination and appointment process for boards of bodies under the aegis of the Department of Health is set out in legislation. In line with Government Decision S180/20/10/1424 of 2011, relating to the advertising for expressions of interest in vacancies on State Boards, my Department currently advertises for board vacancies as they arise, where I, as Minister for Health, have nominating rights under relevant legislation. I also appoint members on the nomination of various bodies, again in accordance with the relevant legislation.

There were some exceptions to the advertising process in 2012 and 2013. In 2012, the members of the Hepatitis C Compensation Tribunal were appointed, on the advice of the Attorney General, as these members carry out a very specific role in relation to assessing the quantum of awards under the Hepatitis C Compensation Tribunal Act. Another exception was in the case of some hospital boards, e.g. Beaumont and St James’s, where the term of existing members was extended as a prudent provisional measure, to allow time for appropriate competencies required in members of these boards to be set out, given the Health Reform Programme and its impact on hospital configuration. Appointments of the new board members were subsequently advertised.

In 2012 existing board members of the National Paediatric Hospital Board were re-appointed for a 3 month period to allow time to consider the competencies required by board members into the future. In January 2013 four Departmental officials and two HSE nominated officials were appointed for a number of months for the same reason. In July 2013, the Chairperson and 3 other members for which the Minister had nominating rights were also appointed.

The table below sets out the number of appointments to State Boards under the remit of the Department, where the Minister has nominating rights since March 2011 to 2014 (to date), including the number that were publicly advertised and the percentage of appointments filled from the advertising process. It should be noted that there were no advertising campaigns in 2011, but 34 appointments were made where the Minister had nominating rights.