Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 18 October 2023
120. Deputy Neasa Hourigan asked the Minister for Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform to outline the work completed on gender equality budgeting by his Department post-Budget 2023 and prior to Budget 2024; the data sets used in that process; the outcomes of those processes, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [45464/23]
Amharc ar fhreagraThe REV contains information on the equality outputs and outcomes that each Department sets out to achieve in the year ahead, so the current REV that was published in December 2022 sets out targets for 2023. Each Department is ultimately responsible for the selection and reporting of equality data, with the support and guidance of the Department of Public Expenditure, NDP Delivery and Reform. Complete data from all Department’s on the selection of equality budgeting metrics are available in the REV at www.gov.ie/en/collection/e20037-revised-estimates. This includes, for example, information on the gender gap in labour market participation rates, female representation on State Boards, percentage of bilateral ODA that is marked as Gender Equality Significant, percentage of women on leadership teams of ISEQ20 listed companies, and the number of bodies funded to support gender equality.
The Public Service Performance Report (PSPR) provides information on how each Department fared in the achievement of their REV targets for the preceding year. The PSPR for 2022, published in June this year, includes 31 sets of Equality Budgeting metrics, with all Government Departments having submitted at least one set of metrics in this latest report. All Departments have reviewed and refined these metrics this year, to strengthen the reporting of this information and to provide greater insight into the progress that is being made within each sector. This report is available at www.gov.ie/en/collection/61d3f-public-service-performance-reports, and includes information on gender budgeting targets such as the percentage of female personnel in the Permanent Defence Force by grade, the number of approvals from the Competitive Start Fund for Female Entrepreneurs, and the rise in the number of female apprentices from 2020 to 2022.
Work is ongoing across all Departments to improve monitoring and oversight of public expenditure to address inequalities across society. During quarter 2 of 2023, the Department of Public Expenditure, NDP Delivery and Reform led a cross-government budget tagging exercise to code expenditure subheads that are designed to alleviate inequalities. This work is still in progress, with the aim of integrating equality budgeting tagging for all voted expenditure in 2024.
My Department, along with the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, co-chairs the Inter-Departmental Network on Equality Budgeting, on which all Departments are represented. This group has a central role to play in ensuring Equality Budgeting is fully implemented across all Government Departments. The most recent meeting took place in June 2023. My Department also chairs the Equality Budgeting Expert Advisory Group set up to guide the overall approach to equality budgeting, which met in March 2023.
There is also continuous engagement with other countries to keep abreast of international developments on Equality Budgeting, and in June 2023 DPENDR successfully hosted the annual meeting of the OECD Senior Officials Network on Gender Budgeting. The Department also continued to progress the Irish workstream of the EU Technical Support Initiative 2022 flagship programme on gender mainstreaming and budgeting, which afforded officials training in international practice in regards gender budgeting.
As outlined above, Equality Budgeting is now firmly a part of the annual budgetary cycle with the key milestones being the publication of the annual REV and PSPR. We continue to refine and develop our equality budgeting structures in line with international best practice, and work to embed it across all Departments. The development of Equality Budgeting has been informed by engagement and consultation with all Departments across Government, and my Department will continue to work with a wide range of stakeholders and international bodies to progress this important initiative.
