Opposition politicians have questioned whether the Government can keep to its decentralisation timetable as only one of 15 projects listed for the first phase had reached the tender stage for construction.
According to a report for the Oireachtas Committee on Finance, of the 15 towns listed for priority, negotiations had yet to be concluded on sites or new offices in nine cases.
The most problematic of the 15 is the proposed move of 40 Department of Transport civil servants to Loughrea, Co Galway, where its initial favoured site is no longer available, and a search for a new site is underway. According to the Decentralisation Implementation Group's report to the Government last November, it is hoped a site will be secured and offices completed by the end of next year. Deals had been concluded on sites in five decentralisation programmes, although the purchases have not been fully finalised.
All 15 are due to begin construction by the end of the year or the beginning of next year at the latest.
One of the 15 priority locations, Sligo, is on an existing State-owned site, and this project is the most advanced. Tenders have been received and a decision on the contract is expected in the coming weeks.
This is the only project in the 15, which will be an extension to an existing office. Part of the Department of Social and Family Affairs was decentralised to the town in the 1990s.
A deal on a site for the new headquarters of the Irish Prison Service in Longford has also been completed, and the tender process is due to get under way soon for the construction of the offices.
The update gives details on a further 15 decentralisation projects that have also been listed for priority, with agreements having been reached on sites, or new office developments, in eight cases.
The 30 sites were identified by the Decentralisation Implementation Group as being the most advanced in terms of being able to proceed for decentralisation on a number of criteria, including site selection and the willingness of civil servants to move there.
Labour's finance spokeswoman Joan Burton said she believed the site update indicated that the plans to have civil servants relocated in 2007 and 2008 to the 30 locations were unrealistic in most cases.
"Certainly my impression from the report is that the sites prioritised for decentralisation are going into a slow phase," she said.
"It's certainly a long way off from what Charlie McCreevy promised to the Dáil when he announced the decentralisation programme in December 2003."
Yesterday a spokesman for the Office of Public Works, which is overseeing the property selections, rejected suggestions that the site selection programme was falling behind.
He said that in most cases, deals were almost finalised on sites.