REFORM OF OTHER SECTORS:THE DEAL covering over 32,000 staff in local authorities provides for more restructuring and redeployment.
It says a key element in reducing internal boundaries and simplifying the production of services will be the rationalisation of State agencies in the local government sector. There will be “a substantial move to shared services for finance, payroll, HR and other activities”.
In the local government sector, “shared service approaches could be investigated to leverage additional value from processes related to the register of electors . . . and the processing of motor tax applications”.
The document says there will be a comprehensive redeployment scheme. “In the local government sector, redeployment will take place in the first instance within individual county and city councils and thereafter between individual county and city councils and between individual county and city councils and other civil and public service bodies,” it states.
Extremely flexible redeployment arrangements must be viewed as the corollary to arrangements that do not provide for compulsory redundancy, it says.
The agreement for the Civil Service says issues such as restricted mobility, staffing levels and structures, work practices, office opening and closing hours, shift patterns, attendances and cross-stream reporting arrangements will be reviewed and may be revised.
“It is accepted that where such practices are shown to give rise to unnecessary costs or inefficiencies, they will be eliminated,” the document states.
Meanwhile, the general secretary of the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors (AGSI) Joe Dirwan told delegates at the its annual conference in Galway that he believed the agreement was “the only show in town”. Under the deal, if the Garda found savings of €85 million through the “transformation agenda”, pay cuts could be reversed.
Current retirement conditions, including a tax-free gratuity payment for Garda members, had been extended to 2011. “In my opinion, it is the best deal available. I don’t believe there is an alternative,” Mr Dirwan said.