Deputy Michael Keating gave me notice of his intention to raise on the Adjournment the subject matter of cutbacks in services in the Office of Consumer Affairs. Deputy Keating has approximately eight minutes and the balance to the Minister.
Adjournment Debate. - Office of Consumer Affairs.
I would like to thank you for giving me the opportunity to raise this very important issue. In the few minutes that are available to us I hope to convey to the Minister of State and the Government the very serious issue that has arisen in relation to the obvious inadequacy of consumer protection. Most of us were startled to be informed, through the Office of the Director of Consumer Affairs, that the situation was so bad in terms of being able to cope with inquiries from the public that the unfortunate gentleman had to say to the nation at large that henceforth it would be simply impossible to adequately cope with public inquiries.
It was not simply that there was to be a downscaling, or 50 per cent reduction in effect, in his capacity to answer telephone inquiries. His press release made it very clear that he also has very severe difficulties at present in handling any form of personal caller, in dealing with written inquiries and, in essence therefore, in coping competently and comprehensively with inquiries at any level in relation to consumer protection.
This must be taken in context with a number of other developments that had occurred in the last year or two, and I include in that the winding up of certain areas of consumer protection, a clear signalling by the Consumers' Association of Ireland that they themselves might have to wind up in view of the fact that the Government found themselves unable to provide a certain element of seed funding which would have allowed matching European funding. Now the statutory body in place to protect the interest of consumers have to declare themselves no longer able to cope with that level of inquiry, clearly signalling very serious assault on the rights of consumers here.
I want the Government to seriously consider this. There is nobody here asking for some simplistic solution, for additional large sums of money to be provided to any office. What I am asking for is a personal and urgent investigation by the Minister and a meeting between him and the Director of Consumer Affairs, so that adequate redeployment of staff from areas of less need and importance will take place if it is discovered, as I am sure it will be on the basis of what Mr. Murray said, that such a need exists.
The amount of work that we have asked the director to handle over the last number of years has continuously increased. He himself indicated that there were now over 50 different areas of legislation, statutes, orders, regulations which he has to cope with and in respect of which there is not one extra head of staff. I am aware that many of his staff are on secondment from the Department of Industry and Commerce where the number of staff has been depleted. At present there is a staff of 27 people to enforce all 50 statutory instruments. These people are deployed around the country as adequately as the director can ensure but still this is very unsatisfactory. It is clear from his press statement that we have to face up to the prospect that no adequate protections for consumers will be in place during the next few months. The present arrangements hardly amount to a fig leaf of cover in providing the scant services available at present and I am very saddened that this should be the case.
The last report of the director indicated that the number of complaints is increasing and that the amount of work we are asking him to handle is increasing. Unfortunately, he now finds himself having to say that members of the public may expect to find difficulty in getting through to the office and are likely to experience long delays before being connected to the section of his office with which they seek contact, if indeed they can be connected at all. In other words, this is a clear indication that those who contact his office may get no satisfaction at all. He also asks somewhat plaintively that rather than ringing his office people should write. While I can sympathise with the director I have to say that that is not an adequate standard of service to be provided to the public. I do not accept such a standard and I do not believe that this House should accept such a standard. It is the Minister who has to deal with this problem and he should respond adequately.
The director went on to say and I quote:
We will not be able to give specific answers or advice to all written complaints or inquiries but we can at least send out some publications which may be helpful in many cases.
None of us could be happy with that and if we were to express satisfaction we would simply be burying our heads in the sand and opening the door to further abuses. We know in our hearts and souls that that is not just a problem now but that it is likely to get worse during the next few years with the elimination of tariff barriers and the open market in 1992. The director has asked for people not to call to his office in person as he has much difficulty in dealing with personal callers. Indeed, he says that present investigations are not being carried out as satisfactorily as he would like. He says that they do investigate complaints of alleged breaches of any of these laws although not always as promptly as they would wish. As the Minister and the House will be aware, if there is to be any effective action, a specific time limit within which such action has to be taken should be laid down because many of the areas in which complaints have been received are covered by various areas of law. Accordingly, it is not simply a matter of putting the complaint to the bottom of the list and getting to it in one or two year's time, even if this were to be deemed a satisfactory service, but rather a matter of dealing with them more quickly because some of the areas in which complaints have been received would be covered by statute and no action could be taken unless complaints were dealt with rapidly.
I am very perturbed at the evident frustration and dissatisfaction of the director which has obliged him to issue this statement today. I want to remind the House that very few of us would be happy with an arrangement where there were only seven inspectors to cover the entire country, one based in Cork, one in Galway and five in Dublin. To put it frankly, that amounts to a very thin service and there is no doubt that there are areas of the country which are policed very thinly, if at all. It is obvious that a serious investigation of false claims, food descriptions, share pushing, below cost selling and all of the other anomolies and abuses which the Minister of State is well aware of cannot take place under the present arrangements.
I could point to semi-State bodies and certain Government Departments where at present there is an under-utilisation of the scarce personnel resources available and I ask that an immediate investigation take place to see whether one or two individuals can be redeployed and I ask the Minister of State to meet immediately with Mr. Murray in an effort to sort this problem out so as to ensure that there will not be a total breakdown of the service being provided.
Let me make it absolutely clear that there has been no reduction in staff numbers in the office of Consumer Affairs and Fair Trade. What has happened is that the director has exercised his managerial role and reallocated staff resources. Up until now, the director assigned two officers to deal full time with telephone inquiries but apparently he has now decided, with effect from 4 July, to assign only one such officer to deal with these inquiries. I understand that these new arrangements are to operate on a trial basis.
The reassignment of officers is surely a common feature in all businesses and organisations today where managers are constantly required to deploy and redeploy staff resources to the optimum benefit. I want to quash any notion which Deputy Keating might be attempting to create that the Government are not committed to giving the public access to their consumer rights. That is not so and the Deputy should take careful note of the fact that staff resources in the director's office have been substantially increased——
So has the workload.
——at a time when resources within the Department have been significantly reduced. In April 1986 there was a total staff in the combined offices of the Examiner of Restrictive Practices and the Director of Consumer Affairs of 16 people. To meet the new challenges and the extra work facing this area staff numbers were increased to 25, a jump of 56 per cent.
What about the increase in workload?
More recently these numbers have been further increased by two or another 8 per cent giving a total complement of 27 staff. Surely, this can reflect nothing other than the Government's wish to ensure that the public have access to their rights in the area of consumer affairs. I would like to add that this increase was granted against the background where, since January 1987, overall staff numbers in the Department have been reduced by some 12 per cent.
May I ask one question? The Minister of State asked the director and the Office of Consumer Affairs and Fair Trade to undertake a number of special investigations during the last year or two which along with the increase in his functions imposed an enormous burden on this gentleman.
Everybody's workload has increased——
That is not true.
Certainly mine has and I am sure the Deputy's has.
Not to the same degree as this.
Everybody's workload is increasing and to get a 56 per cent increase in staff numbers is adequate.
That is not a fair statement.
The Dáil adjourned at 5.30 p.m. until 2.30 p.m. on Wednesday, 19 October 1988.