asked the Minister for Agriculture if he will state if he intends assigning secretarial and accountancy duties to the successful candidates for the posts of chief agricultural officer under county committees of agriculture which have been recently advertised; if so, if he will state what secretarial and accountancy qualifications and/or experience he has prescribed as essential qualifications for candidates for these posts and if he has not prescribed any secretarial and accountancy qualifications and/or experience, if he will state what steps he has taken, or proposes to take, to ensure that the successful candidates will be competent to execute personally their secretarial and accountancy duties, and what steps he will take to ensure that such successful candidates will personally execute such duties.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Chief Agricultural Officers' Qualifications.
The duties of a chief agricultural officer under a county committee of agriculture include the duty of acting as secretary and accountant to the committee.
Permanent posts of chief agricultural officer are filled by reference to the Local Appointments Commissioners who, in accordance with their statutory duties, prescribe the qualifications and experience necessary. Each candidate for such a post must possess a recognised university degree in general agriculture or the diploma of the Royal College of Science of Ireland and must have served for not less than five years as instructor in agriculture under a committee or committees of agriculture or as parish agricultural advisory agent under the Department of Agriculture, or as both. He must also satisfy the Local Appointments Commissioners that he possesses a high standard of suitability for the proper discharge of the duties of the office.
It rests with the commissioners to ensure that the candidate recommended by them for a post of chief agricultural officer will be competent to execute the duties attached thereto.
The general responsibility for seeing that a chief agricultural officer executes the duties of his office rests primarily on his employers, namely the county committee of agriculture concerned. The accounts of each county committee of agriculture are audited annually by auditors appointed by the Minister for Local Government.
Is it not usual for the Minister for Agriculture to prescribe the minimum qualifications necessary for the filling of those posts in the matter of accountancy?
Not so far as I am aware. I understand that the local authority submits qualifications, which the Minister approves or to which he requires amendment. I am not sure whether the Appointments Commissioners do not have a hand in it. So far as I am aware, the thing is common form. I do not think I ever read the qualifications submitted to me for an officer of such a body.