Paul Donnelly (Dublin West, Sinn Fein)
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546. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the WTE staff, by grade, working within the import controls operations division within his Department as of 10 May 2023; the number of vacant WTE staff by grade within his Department; and when these vacancies will be filled, in tabular form. [23087/23]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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My Department has numerous staff members engaged in work relating to import controls functions. The following table shows the number of officers currently deployed as such;

*FTE = Full Time Equivalent

My Department is committed to making sure that a skilled, motivated workforce is in place to meet business needs. The Department uses Workforce Planning to identify and address these requirements. Given its size, the Department’s vacancies constantly change as staff are recruited and other staff leave and retire. The current vacancies are listed below as requested. Work to fill all vacancies is a permanent feature of my Department's work and assignments are ongoing across all grade streams. These vacancies are either in the process of being filled or are being advertised by either the Public Appointments Service (PAS) or directly by my Department's Human Resources Division.

The highest number of vacancies is in the Technical Agricultural Officer grade stream and a competition closed in April 2023. When the selection process is completed it is expected the successful candidate pool from this current competition will eliminate the current vacancies.

I am acutely aware of the need for farmers and members of the public to avail of services promptly and efficiently, and all critical staffing vacancies are filled as soon as possible.