I thank the Chairman for the welcome and for introducing my colleagues. I will outline their roles. Ms Áine Stapleton is assistant secretary for corporate affairs, Ms Aoife O'Grady is head of corporate support and communications and Ms Jane Lawlor works with Ms O'Grady on the issue of governance co-ordination. Mr. Ray O'Leary and Mr. Kenneth Spratt are members of our management board. Mr. O'Leary chairs our risk committee and Mr. Spratt is chair of our governance committee and a member of our internal audit committee.
I thank the committee for giving me the opportunity to speak on the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport's corporate governance framework. The Department has a wide remit with high level goals in its statement of strategy covering public transport investment and regulation, roads and road safety, aviation, maritime transport, tourism and sport with an annual budget of €2.3 billion. Good governance is essential to the effective operation of a Department of this complexity and breadth. The arrangements in place help to provide assurance to me, in my role as Secretary General and as Accounting Officer, that we are effectively discharging our responsibilities.
I will begin by focusing on the departmental arrangements. While Civil Service Departments have always valued strong governance, a greater focus on formalising our arrangements has its origins in a 2014 initiative, Strengthening Civil Service Accountability and Performance. That paper recommended a written governance framework as a platform for strengthening the overall management of Government Departments. This concept was incorporated into the 2014 Civil Service renewal plan which, in Action 3, committed to a common Civil Service Government standard. Our corporate governance arrangements for the Department are, therefore, grounded in the corporate governance standard for the Civil Service which was led by the Civil Service management board as part of its implementation of the renewal plan.
Chapter 1 of our framework document frames our overall activities by setting out a general overview of the Department's structures, ethos and strategy. It sets out our mission statement which is to shape the safe and sustainable development of transport, tourism and sport, and to support economic growth and social progress.
Chapter 2 defines the roles and responsibilities of ministerial and senior management staff, the Department’s relationship with the Minister and the Minister for State and provides an overview of senior management governance roles and responsibilities. The chapter also looks at how responsibility is assigned to officers of the Department for the performance of functions under the Public Service Management Act 1997.
Chapter 3 sets out the primary management structures within the Department to provide a means to develop its capacity, including the capabilities of the leadership team, management and staff.
Chapter 4 details the mechanisms through which the Department ensures risk and performance are adequately managed through robust internal control systems and effective performance management practices.
Chapter 5 details the Department's relationship with the 24 agencies under its aegis and provides an overview of the approach applied to external governance and oversight. In engaging with stakeholders the Department strives for openness, transparency and accountability which are delivered through our robust governance structures and the relationship we have in place with our agencies.
With a view to continuous improvement of its overall performance, including a desire to strengthen its approach to governance and improve its strategic focus, I recommended that the Department participate in the pilot organisational capability review, OCR, in 2017 under the Civil Service renewal programme. It was a valuable exercise which led to the development of an action plan in January 2018, aligned with four pillars, namely, investing in our team; communication and integrated working; stronger strategic focus; and policy implementation. A key part of ensuring effective delivery of the four pillars involved reorganising internal structures to provide for strategic leadership and ownership at both management board and divisional level as implementation commenced. The changes were implemented to strengthen all areas of governance and demonstrate our commitment through a range of actions. In January 2018 I centralised the corporate and policy co-ordination functions under a new assistant secretary post to give a stronger strategic focus to our corporate affairs and policy co-ordination. This reconfiguring of all corporate functions within the remit of one assistant secretary provides overarching responsibility for the Department’s governance structures. It included creating a dedicated governance division, which deals not only with the Department’s overall governance requirements but also the oversight of the 24 agencies under the aegis of the Department. The centralising of the governance role has provided for consistency throughout the Department, with a central contact point to manage governance requirements and oversight of the governance structures in place. I am confident that the revised arrangements, together with structural changes made earlier last year, will help to bring a clearer focus to the successful delivery of the Department’s business objectives. The reconfiguration of the corporate functions is central to it by providing the Department and all staff with the necessary support to deliver to the highest standards.
In addition, the introduction of new structures has allowed for the consideration and refinement of implementation actions by heads of function, HoF, through the newly established HoF forum. As part of this structural change, my management board colleagues and I gave approval for the establishment of a governance committee to oversee and advise us on the ongoing development of a good practice governance framework for the Department; the arrangements to ensure compliance with the Department’s corporate obligations; the implementation of the framework for the governance of State agencies within the remit of the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport; and the liaison arrangements with the risk management committee and audit committee on an ongoing basis. This structure has worked very well in providing additional governance support for the management board and is underpinned by a governance calendar which records all governance requirements across the Department in ensuring the meeting of corporate obligations and the extent to which they are being met in accordance with an agreed calendar of activities.
The management board continues to play a central role in overseeing the governance structures in place. It includes but is not limited to engaging in business planning with each sector to ensure our high level goals are being carried into annual business planning and that good progress is being made in their implementation; reviewing on an annual basis the Department’s’ corporate governance framework; keeping under review the governance arrangements in place with the commercial State agencies under the aegis of the Department; keeping under review the governance arrangements in place with the non-commercial State agencies under the aegis of the Department. Given the broad remit of the Department and the diverse range of functions carried out through the 24 agencies, strong corporate governance measures for our agencies are essential building blocks in our overall governance structures and procedures. The approach to the governance of our agencies takes account of the Civil Service framework and is also grounded in the revised code of practice for the governance of State bodies which was published by the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform in 2016. It is the principal framework for best practice governance arrangements applicable to commercial and non-commercial State bodies. It is intended to take account of developments in oversight arrangements, with the parent Department and internal practices of the State body including reporting requirements and the appointment of board members.
In March 2018 we adopted a new framework document for the Department’s oversight of the governance of both commercial and non-commercial State bodies. The core objective of the document was to establish the means by which the Department as a whole would oversee the governance of its State bodies and how I, as Accounting Officer, and the wider management board could be assured on compliance by our State bodies with the revised 2016 code of practice. The framework assists with strong governance in a number of respects. It provides guidance for all stakeholders on the Government’s current objectives for State bodies and their subsidiaries and enables us to maintain a consistent and structured approach to governance. It clearly defines the Department’s relationship with State bodies and the mechanisms to monitor output, outcomes and performance. The document also outlines the roles and responsibilities of all stakeholders in keeping with the governing legislation for the State bodies involved. To ensure consistency and quality in terms of outputs, the Department has provided templates for shareholder expectation letters, performance delivery agreements, oversight agreements and a compliance checklist to be filled in by the State body and returned with the chairperson’s comprehensive report each year. Implementation of these arrangements is reported to the management board, with follow-up actions taken to deal with outstanding issues.
I have also put new arrangements in place to give the management board a stronger role in assessing requests from our non-commercial agencies for additional staffing to ensure a stronger whole of sector approach is taken to such issues. Good governance is, of course, not just a theoretical framework but is intended to lead to better outputs for the Department and its agencies. The corporate governance arrangements in place play an important role in helping us to achieve our goals and objectives.
