Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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1848. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the staff costs to date in 2017, based on her Department’s request for 200 additional staff over a four year period regarding those only directly involved in the public service card project; the staff costs for staff involved in the internal upgrade of the ICT systems; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [37876/17]

Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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In all, 2.8m Public Services Cards (PSC) have issued since SAFE registration commenced in 2011, and 66% of adults resident in the State have now completed registration to SAFE Level 2 (substantial assurance of identity) , which is the minimum for issue of a PSC.

SAFE registration facilities are available at over 100 of the Department’s locations nationally, and in at least one location in every county in the State. In-person SAFE registrations currently exceed 12,000 weekly.

Currently the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform has sanctioned a total of up to 218 posts for the Public Services Card project. These posts include both temporary and permanent roles, and the numbers and locations of deployed staff are kept under constant review to ensure the best use of resources.

As of July 2017 there are 55.63 full-time-equivalent permanent staff (FTE) and 146 Temporary Clerical Officers working on the PSC Project. These figures include four full-time IT staff assigned to the PSC project. This represents a full-year staff cost of €5,857,888.33.