Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 16 December 2014
624. Deputy Lucinda Creighton asked the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources further to Parliamentary Question No. 570 of 26 November 2014, the reason his Department failed to mention management advisory committee meetings held on a weekly basis with him; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [47855/14]
View answer625. Deputy Lucinda Creighton asked the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources if his Department held meetings separate to the management advisory committee meetings which were attended by either him or the Minister of State and the management advisory committee; if so, if he will provide, in tabular form, the number of such meetings that occurred in 2011, 2012, 2013 and to date in 2014; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [47859/14]
View answer626. Deputy Lucinda Creighton asked the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources if he will provide, in tabular form, the number of management advisory committee meetings which were held for each of the years 2011, 2012, 2013 and to date in 2014; if he will provide, in tabular form, the number of management advisory committee meetings that were attended by him, the Minister of State, the political adviser, the Secretary General and all other titles of attendees in the years 2011, 2012, 2013 and to date in 2014; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [47875/14]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 624 to 626, inclusive, together.
The Question posed by the Deputy which was the subject of a reply on 26 November 2014 related to meetings of the Department’s Management Advisory Committee (MAC), which is chaired by the Secretary General of the Department, and the reply dealt with that matter accordingly. The reply also stated that there are monthly meetings between the MAC and the Minister and Minister of State to review Departmental business priorities.
Information in relation to the number of meetings of the MAC for the period set out in the Question is detailed in the following table:
Management Advisory Committee Meetings
|
2011 |
2012 |
2013 |
2014 |
|
33 |
37 |
37 |
27 |
Information in relation to the number of meetings between the MAC and the Minister and Minister of State is detailed in the following table:
Meetings between Management Advisory Committee, Minister and Minister of State
Attendees*: Minister; Minister of State; Secretary General; Assistant Secretaries; Political Advisors; Department Press Officer
* Not all attendees would have attended every meeting
|
2011 |
2012 |
2013 |
2014 |
|
18 |
30 |
34 |
22 |
I understand that my predecessor met with the MAC generally on a weekly basis.
As stated in my reply to Question No. 570 of 26 November, regular meetings between Ministers and the relevant senior officials on individual business priorities are a common feature of the working arrangements in the Department.
In addition to scheduled meetings, meetings with the Minister and the MAC would generally occur in advance of Oral PQ sessions. Weekly meetings between the Minster and the Secretary General are scheduled for Monday and Tuesday of each week but there is also regular contact outside of these scheduled meetings. The Ministers would, of course, on a day-to-day basis, have various formal and informal meetings involving one or more members of the MAC on issues across the range of Departmental responsibilities and it would not be possible to produce a complete statistical return of these.
