The Government has moved to address opposition to its controversial decentralisation proposals, agreeing to hold Oireachtas hearings on the issue and insisting it is open to consultation with unions and other interests. Mark Brennock, Chief Political Correspondent, reports.
Minister of State Mr Tom Parlon is due to go on radio this morning to say that the Government will listen to those who have concerns about the plan.
This will be his second radio interview in 24 hours, and follows union complaints after yesterday's interview that the Government was refusing to consult with anybody about the proposal.
While Mr Parlon said yesterday that his door was "always open", he insisted the plan was going ahead.
The Association of Higher Civil Servants later complained that there was no means for it to get its views across to Government or the Oireachtas.
However, yesterday a Government-controlled committee agreed to hold two days of hearings on the Coalition's plan to move 10,000 civil servants out of Dublin despite rejecting calls for such hearings five weeks ago.
And this morning Mr Parlon will say that the Government has been consulting with interested parties, and is open to further representations from unions.
The chairman of the Oireachtas Finance Committee, Fianna Fáil's Mr Seán Fleming TD, confirmed yesterday that the committee would hold hearings either late this month or in September.
The agreement to hold the hearings comes after some Dublin Fianna Fáil and PD figures claimed that the decentralisation plan damaged them in the capital in the local elections.
However, despite Opposition hopes that this would lead some Government deputies to criticise the decentralisation plan, the only Dublin-based committee member, Mr Conor Lenihan, said yesterday he was an enthusiastic supporter of the proposal.
The confirmation that hearings will now take place followed the Tánaiste's statement in the Dáil yesterday that she now favoured an examination of the controversial proposal by the committee.
In contrast, just a fortnight ago Ms Harney resisted Opposition demands for committee hearings, telling the Dáil: "We are not obliged to have hearings."
She told the Dáil yesterday on behalf of the Government that "I favour the committee examining this matter".
She said the committee's decision last month not to hold hearings had been its own, and there had been no instruction to the committee from the Government last month not to hold hearings on the issue "to the best of my knowledge".
In May, the Fianna Fáil group on the committee imposed a whip to vote down a proposal from Fine Gael and Sinn Féin that it hear evidence on the plan. During bad-tempered exchanges on the issue, Fianna Fáil members accused the Opposition of being against the plan.
The committee chairman, Mr Fleming, yesterday backed Ms Harney's assertion that the Government had not asked the committee not to hold such hearings.
"Fianna Fáil members voted against holding hearings two days after the local elections," he said.
"But that was because the banks issue was coming to the fore, and we hoped to get AIB in to talk to us then. Our only mistake was we allowed people say we were against discussing it, but we were only against the timing."
He said he had spoken to Ms Harney yesterday before she came out in favour of holding hearings. He had told her that the committee's problem had only been the timing, and that it did not oppose discussing the matter.
He said the committee would decide next Wednesday on the timing of the hearings, and who it wished to call to give evidence. He said he thought they would take place either at the end of this month or in September.
He expected they would hear evidence from Mr Phil Flynn, the chairman of the implementation group charged with delivering the plan.
They would also hear from civil service unions representing all levels within the public service, and local interests from regions to which public service jobs were to be decentralised.
Mr Lenihan said yesterday that while decentralisation may have been an election issue for some, "there seems to be a mistaken impression that people are to be forced to leave Dublin. This is not the case, and the hue and cry is largely misplaced."
He said it was short-sighted to see decentralisation as being negative for Dublin.
"Dublin has a huge advantage in attracting inward investment, and that more than compensates for the loss of some civil service jobs to other regions."