As Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, I have overarching responsibly for employment in the Civil Service. Other Ministers are responsible for employment in other sectors such as local authorities, HSE etc.
As the Deputy will be aware, Government Departments and Offices have been working under delegated sanction arrangements for their recruitment and staffing issues since 2015. Under these arrangements, which are in place for most central Government Departments and Offices, there are multi-annual pay ceilings agreed and set. Thereafter, decisions about recruitment and promotion and overall grade composition up to an including Principal Officer level are devolved.
As the Deputy will be aware, in general, selection competitions within the Civil Service take place by way of;
- competitions confined to particular Departments (Internal promotion) or
- from competitions open to candidates from all Departments (Interdepartmental promotion) or
- from open competitions to all eligible candidates including members of the public
Interdepartmental competitions are organised on behalf of the Civil Service by the Public Appointments Service (PAS), which is an independent statutory body. They have supplied the following information on the number of staff assigned from interdepartmental competitions for 2017 and 2018. Salary Information requested by the Deputy is not available. However, all salary scale circulars are available on my Department's website.
Assignments from Interdepartmental Competitions 2017-2018
Grade
|
Assigned in 2017
|
Assigned in 2018
|
Assistant Principal Officer
|
|
|
AP2016
|
62
|
-
|
AP2017
|
77
|
82
|
Higher Executive Officer
|
|
|
HEO2016
|
369
|
32
|
HEO2017
|
21
|
206
|
Executive Officer
|
|
|
EO2014
|
65
|
0
|
EO2016
|
146
|
86
|
Internal competitions are a matter for individual Departments and Offices and replies to that part of this Parliamentary Question are being supplied directly by them. The information in respect of internal competitions in my own Department is set out in the following table.
Assignments from DPER Confined Competitions 2017-2018
Grade
|
Assigned in 2017
|
Assigned in 2018
|
Principal Officer Higher
|
5
|
0
|
Assistant Principal Officer Higher
|
14
|
0
|
Higher Executive Officer
|
5
|
2
|
Executive Officer
|
1
|
2
|
All starting pay on promotion calculations following a confined competition are calculated on a case-by-case basis and in accordance with the relevant circular. The current salary scales can be found in Circular 22/2017.