Brendan Griffin (Kerry South, Fine Gael)
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267. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine his views on a matter (details supplied) regarding redeployment; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6121/15]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The position is that while administrative functions have been transferred from my Department’s office in Tralee to Portlaoise, Department vets, inspectors and technical officers remain in place in Tralee and continue to provide a service to my Department’s clients across all of the schemes that are provided from this office. Thus, frontline services are being fully maintained and public access for all of the Department’s stakeholders will continue to be available in the Tralee office.

The transfer of administrative functions out of the Tralee office arises from an extensive review of the local office structure which was carried out by the Department over the last number of years.  This review concluded that, arising from investment in technology and the substantial reduction in disease levels in recent years, significant efficiencies would accrue from the centralisation of administrative functions, thereby giving rise to scope for redeployment of administrative staff from existing local offices. 

In line with Government policy, my Department has actively sought redeployment opportunities for administrative staff in local offices and in the vast majority of cases, arrangements have been made to maintain staff in their existing geographic location.  However, in the case of Tralee, while my Department, together with the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, pursued all avenues to identify redeployment opportunities there, unfortunately it was not possible to identify any at that location.  Given that no options were available in Tralee, my Department acceded to a request from the Financial Shared Services Centre in Killarney and redeployed the staff there in accordance with the provisions of the Public Service Agreement 2010-2014.