asked the Minister for the Public Service if the recruitment of parliamentary draftsmen is subject to the embargo on recruitment in the public service whereby only one in three vacancies can be filled.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Recruitment of Parliamentary Draftsmen.
12.
Throughout the Civil Service it has been decided that only one vacancy out of every three may be filled. This arrangement applies without exception in the Civil Service, including the Attorney General's office where the parliamentary draftsmen are located.
Where small numbers of staff or scarce expertise are affected by this arrangement, special measures may be necessary and I am at present in touch with the Attorney General in relation to parliamentary draftsmen.
Will the Minister indicate how many vacancies, if any, exist at the moment in respect of the post of parliamentary draftsman?
I do not think I have that information to hand.
Who will be the new Attorney General?
May we take that as an application?
Will it be Fine Gael or Labour? Have the Government settled that yet?
Will the Minister make the information I requested available to us?
Perhaps it might help the Deputy if I explained that we are examining a number of different possibilities. You do not buy parliamentary draftsmen off the shelf. The training of parliamentary draftsmen, even in respect of people who have quite a range of legal qualifications, takes quite a time and the lead-in time with regard to drafting is considerable. In order to assist the Attorney General's office we are looking at various methods whereby the pressure that may come on the office from time to time will be relieved. However, I can let the Deputy know the establishment number and the numbers currently serving.
Will the Minister tell the House the number of so-called Bills that are held up because of the lack of parliamentary draftsmen?
I do not have that information. As the Deputy is aware, there is always a queue of draft legislation or heads of Bills awaiting attention by the parliamentary draftsmen. If that were not the case it would mean that Departments were not engaged in the business of preparing heads of Bills. There is a considerable amount of work in the conduit between Departments, the Government and the Oireachtas at any one time.
There is nothing before the House.
I would have thought the House was fairly busy during the past few weeks.
There is very little on the Order of Business.
If the Order of Business took less time there might be more time for legislation.