The Office of the Data Protection Commissioner (ODPC) was established under Section 9 of the Data Protection Act 1988. The Data Protection Commissioner's statutory functions include the monitoring of implementation of data protection law, the investigation of complaints and, where appropriate, the taking of legal proceedings in the event of breaches of data protection rules. The ODPC is an Office under the aegis of my Department but is statutorily independent in the discharge of its functions. Accordingly, as Minister, I have no role in relation to the processing of complaints.
The Government, and I as Minister, continue to keep the resourcing of the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner actively under review and my aim is to ensure that the Commissioner has the necessary resources to continue to meet the ongoing demands of this expanding sector.
In this regard, I am pleased to confirm that the resources made available to the ODPC have been significantly increased. The ODPC's 2015 budget allocation of €3.647m is double its allocation for the previous year and sanction was received from the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform for an additional 18 staff across a range of grades. With 17 of these additional staff in place by October 2015, the ODPC's staff numbers will have increased to 46, representing an increase of more than 50% over 2014 staffing levels and, as I have set out above, this is kept under review.
