Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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312. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the reason demand by Government Departments for staff from the 2024 Open Competition for Assistant Principal is so low; the number of candidates he expects to be recruited from this competition by September 2025; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28553/25]

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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As the Deputy may be aware, public service staffing is largely managed through a policy of delegated sanction, which has been in place since 2015. Under this delegated sanction framework, Departments are permitted to fill vacancies through recruitment and/or promotion where they hold a recruitment license subject to remaining within the overall pay bill ceiling. As a consequence, vacancies at the Assistant Principal level are being filled from both publicjobs’ Open panel, an Interdepartmental panel formed in parallel and panels created by Departments through their own competitions.

The 2024 Open Competition for Assistant Principal was advertised by publicjobs on 4th October 2024 and the first panels were formed on the 15th April 2025. Publicjobs have begun assigning candidates from these in the last couple of weeks. As such, it is early to assess the level of demand.

An Interdepartmental promotion competition for Assistant Principal was run in conjunction with this competition and a panel has been formed from which candidates will also be assigned to meet sequencing agreements.

The number of vacancies filled from the above campaigns is determined by ongoing demand from Departments and Offices and the volume of requests received. Consequently, I am informed by publicjobs that they cannot at this stage determine the number of successful applicants that will be assigned by the end of the life of the panel.