Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 13 Apr 2000

Vol. 518 No. 2

Written Answers. - Departmental Staff.

Róisín Shortall

Question:

82 Ms Shortall asked the Minister for Finance if he will report on the overall staffing levels in the Office of the Revenue Commissioners for each of the past five years; and in regard to the current staffing, if he will provide a breakdown of all the units or sections in which the staff are deployed; who decides on the order of priority of work to be undertaken, and the staff allocation and the criteria on which these decisions are taken; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11337/00]

Minister for Finance (Mr. McCreevy)

I have been informed that the authorised staffing levels for the Office of the Revenue Commissioners for the past five years were as follows:

Date	Number
1 January 1996	6,383
1 January 1997	6,383
1 January 1998	6,044
1 January 1999	6,089
1 January 2000	6,089

In addition, I have recently approved significant increases in the Revenue's staffing resources to deal with audit, investigation, enforcement, taxpayer service and other work, and these will be coming onstream shortly.

I have also been informed that the allocation of the current serving staff in Revenue is as follows:

Division	Number
Board	9
Revenue Solicitor's Office	34.5
Corporate Management Division	234
Human Resources Division	230
Collector-General's Office	622
Customs & Residence Division	294.5
Information & Communications Technology Division	328.5
Division	Number
Capital Taxes Division	152.5
Direct Taxes International & Administration Division	42.5
Direct Taxes Policy & Legislation Division	28
Indirect Taxes Policy & Legislation Division	43.5
C&E Collections & Enforcement Divisions	1318.5
Office of the Inspector of Taxes	2721
Total	6058.5

I have been advised that the board of the Revenue Commissioners decides on the overall deployment of staff to various work programmes. These decisions are linked to the priorities identified in the Revenue Commissioners' Statement of Strategy, the divisional business plans and other priorities which emerge. Division heads would, of course, have certain flexibility in day-to-day deployment. In deploying staff resources, the commissioners seek to achieve a balance between staff deployed on customer service, on audit and on investigation and enforcement. The need to ensure that the budget target for collecting the various taxes and duties is met is always a priority. The commissioners, as with any large organisation, must adopt an approach to the deployment of staff which enables them to respond in a flexible and timely manner to emerging situations.