Written Answers Nos. 15 - 17.
15. Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the estimated number and percentage of civil servants who are competent to carry out their duties through the medium of Irish and English; his views on whether this number is adequate; his plans to increase this number and percentage; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2579/14]
View answerThe detailed information requested by the Deputy in his question is not available as it is not collected on a routine basis by my Department.
In October, 2013, the Government approved the introduction of a new approach to support Irish language proficiency in the civil service to replace the policy of awarding bonus marks for Irish language proficiency in civil service recruitment and promotion competitions.
As a first step, the new arrangements will be piloted in the upcoming Executive Officer (EO) recruitment competition in Spring 2014. It is proposed that a sub-panel of Irish language functional bilinguals comprising up to 6% of the overall EO panel size, will be created.
In the case of Departmental recruitment and promotion competitions, an assessment will be made of the requirement for functional bilinguals and, where necessary and appropriate, a sub-panel of functional bilinguals will be put in place.
Where a post is identified as requiring proficiency in Irish, the intention is that it should be filled by a functional bilingual. The use of staff currently serving in such posts will be a matter for the individual Departments to decide.
As part of the implementation of these new arrangements, my officials wrote to Departments on 17 December last, asking them to review the workforce planning frameworks previously submitted and to identify posts/areas of work requiring functional bilinguals and to include these in a revised workforce action plan. This exercise is expected to provide information on the demand from Departments for functional bilinguals and will facilitate arrangements being put in place to ensure that the requirement for Government Departments to provide services through Irish is met.
16. Deputy Charlie McConalogue asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the capital projects in County Donegal where funding will be made available in 2014; if funding will be made available in 2014 for the Cockhill Bridge in Buncrana; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2670/14]
View answer31. Deputy Charlie McConalogue asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the capital projects in County Donegal where funding will be made available in 2014; if funding will be made available in 2014 for the Bonagee Link Road Project in Letterkenny; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2671/14]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 16 and 31 together.
My Department is responsible for setting the overall capital allocations across Departments and for monitoring monthly capital expenditure at Departmental level. Within the overall allocations set by my Department, individual Ministers and their Departments allocate capital funds across various projects and programmes in line with their Department s priorities. Information in relation to allocations at project level can be obtained from the relevant Departments who will also have appropriate information regarding regional allocations.
Details in relation to the overall Exchequer capital budget for 2014 along with the allocations for individual Departments is set out in the Revised Estimates for Public Services 2014 which is available on my Department's website.
17. Deputy David Stanton asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform his Department's role in monitoring the budget of the Department of Health; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2623/14]
View answerThe mission of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, as set out in our Statement of Strategy, is to serve the country, its people and the Government by delivering well managed and well targeted public spending, delivered through modernised, effective and accountable public services.
We want to ensure sound and sustainable management of public spending that can underpin the delivery of the Goverment's economic and social priorities, and to be high quality partners to all stakeholders in the delivery of better and more accountable public services.
In relation to Health expenditure, as with all other areas of expenditure, my Department monitors the implementation by the Department of Health and the HSE of Government policy in relation to public expenditure and pay. This includes, for example, examining the business case for moratorium exemptions, consents for borrowings, joint ventures, capital investment plans, proposals for pension schemes etc. It also includes vigorously promoting reform and value for money across expenditure programmes.
