The 'Bord Snip' report has recommended axing 17,358 jobs across the public sector, including eliminating some 6,000 jobs in the Department of Health and Children and 7,000 in the Department of Education.
Speaking this afternoon, UCD economist Dr Colm McCarthy, who produced the report, said he believed the jobs cuts were “feasible” but was not sure how they would be achieved.
“We tried to identify areas where it is possible to reduce numbers,” he said.
Defending the proposals for job cuts in the Departments of Health and Education, Mr McCarthy said it was “not feasible to cut the public sector wage bill without targeting these departments given they are the biggest employers in the public sector.”
He said administrative staff numbers in the health service were “high” when compared with other countries and that class sizes in Ireland “were not enormous”.
“Those who teach English to newcomer children for example are not needed as much as they were before,” he said.
Proposed job cuts at other departments include axing 1,140 jobs at the Department of Agriculture, 594 jobs at the Department of Trade & Employment, 196 jobs at the Department of Community, Rural & Gaeltacht affairs. The report recommends closing the latter completely.
It proposes 300 job cuts at the Department of Environment, 80 at the Department of Transport, 170 at the Department of Arts & Tourism, 540 at the Department of Justice, 106 at the Department of Communications, Energy & Natural Resources, 520 at the Department of Defence, 660 at the Department of Finance and 65 at the Department of Foreign Affairs.
As well as job cuts, the report recommends savings in relation to allowances received by gardai, health sector workers and teachers.
It says the payment of management allowances to teachers should be scrapped as well as allowances for substitution and supervision duties.
It says contracts for teachers should be revised so that their total working time be sufficiently increased to provide for activities such as school planning, parent teacher meetings, in-service training and development, supervision of students and middle-management duties.
The gardai are also targeted by the report which says the “liberal system of allowances” paid to members of the force “was not in the public interest.”
Gardai are currently in receipt of benefits ranging from rent allowance to boot, uniform and plain clothes allowances.
The report says these allowances whould be revised with the aim of “securing efficiencies in the delivery of policing services.”
Staff in the health sector should be required to work the weekly basic contracted hours for their grade within the span of 8am to 8pm on a five-day over seven-day basis with no premium payment for hours worked between 8am and 8pm.
Overtime rates should be reviewed and location and specialist qualification allowances should be scrapped.
All expenses and allowances enjoyed by members of the Oireachtas should be subject to verification, according to the report.
Overnight expense allowances should be curtailed, parking rights to serving members and staff limited, the secretarial allowance for Ministers and Ministers of State should be reviewed and independent TDs and senators should not be allowed to obtain a party leader's allowance.