Departmental Staff.

Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 12 December 2006

Tuesday, 12 December 2006

Questions (349, 350)

Eamon Gilmore

Question:

368 Mr. Gilmore asked the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment in respect of each Minister of State within his Department the number of staff broken down by grade employed within their private office and their constituency office; the number of staff who are permanent civil servants; the number who are political appointees; the annual cost of each such office in terms of salary, overtime and expenses; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42726/06]

Written answers

Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment (Mr. Martin)

The breakdown of staff by grade currently employed in the two Ministers of State Offices at the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment is outlined in Table 1.

Table 1

	Number
Office of the Minister for Labour Affairs (Mr. Tony Killeen TD)
Departmental Office	1 Higher Executive Office 1 Executive Officer 2 Clerical Officers
Constituency Office	1 Personal Assistant (Political appointee) 1 Personal Secretary (Political appointee) 1 Clerical Officer
Office of the Minister for Trade and Commerce (Mr. Michael Ahern TD)
Departmental Office	1 Higher Executive Officer 1 Executive Officer 2 Clerical Officers
Constituency Office	1 Personal Assistant (Political appointee) 1 Personal Secretary (Political appointee) 1 Clerical Officer

Each Minister of State also employs 2 Civilian Drivers. The drivers work alternate weeks on a week on/week off basis. The current salary for a Civilian Driver is €31,551.68 per annum. There are 5 permanent civil servants and 4 political appointees, which includes the 2 Civilian Drivers in each Minister of State's Office. The salary costs, overtime and expenses for each of the Minister's Offices from 1st December 2005 to 1st December 2006 are set out in Table 2. It should be noted that the salary costs are inclusive of overtime payments and the Civilian Driver salaries. The expenses refer to travel and subsistence costs and mobile phone costs.

Table 2

	Salaries	Expenses
	€	€
Office of the Minister for Labour Affairs
Departmental Office	162,045.19	13,069.11
Constituency Office	180,051.73	35,812.78
Office of the Minister for Trade and Commerce
Departmental Office	170,594.30	9,205.41
Constituency Office	179,054.62	30,395.94

Eamon Gilmore

Question:

369 Mr. Gilmore asked the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the number of staff broken down by grade employed within his private office and his constituency office; the number of staff who are permanent civil servants; the number who are political appointees; the annual cost of each such office in terms of salary, overtime and expenses; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42741/06]

Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment (Mr. Martin)

The information in relation to staffing of my Office is set out in the tables:

Staffing of Private Office

	Number
Higher Executive Officer (Private Secretary)	1
Executive Officers	2
Clerical Officers	5
Total	8

The staff in the table above are civil servants.

Constituency Office

	Number
Clerical Officers (Civil Servants)	2.8
Personal Assistants (non-civil servants)	1.5
Personal Secretary (non-civil servant)	1
Total	5.3

Additional staff include: 1 Special Adviser, 1 Policy Adviser and 1 Press Adviser (Salary & expenses in relation to these staff are included in the overall Private Office figure). My Special Adviser is a civil servant whilst my Policy Adviser and Press Adviser are non-civil servants. The total annual cost of running the Private and Constituency Office from 1st December 2005 to the 1st December 2006 was €599,095.36 and €165,180.91 respectively.