A PROGRAMME of public service reform would probably take seven years to complete, according to Minister of State Ms Avril Doyle (FG). She told an Oireachtas committee yesterday it would have to be radical and would run through the term of the next government and into the one after that.
The Minister of State for Finance and the Taoiseach, who has responsibility for overseeing the Strategic Management Initiative, said previous reform attempts had failed because governments had changed and political parties had adopted different positions.
Concluding the two day discussion on public service efficiency at the Dail Committee on Finance and General Affairs, she said: "If we begin to play politics with this, we will destroy for decades a chance to reform the public service."
She said all members of the committee agreed on the need for change and to focus on the quality of service being provided to the public. "Whatever public service reform programme is agreed must have the support of all members of the House."
Past reform attempts had also failed because they pursued efficiency, which was an abstraction.
She implied there was a lack of enthusiasm for reform in some sections of the public service, saying different departments had responded differently when asked to produce a strategic plan. "There are departments who don't want to know, who have hardly submitted their strategic plans, while other departments are leading the way.
She said the Strategic Management Initiative was a way of focusing attention on fundamental issues which managers in the public service must regularly confront: why are we doing what we are doing?; what business are we in?; who are our clients?; and can we conduct our business differently and better?
If Ireland had a public service that cost too much and was an unnecessary drain on public resources, then the State could not be truly competitive.
"In this connection, I make a distinction between the overall, level of the pay bill that we can afford and individual rates of pay. Logic dictates that the fewer the number of public servants, the more each could be rewarded," Ms Doyle said.
Referring to the introduction of a partial embargo on filling public service vacancies for 1996, she said she recognised this was a "blunt instrument but in the absence of a strategic management approach and the flexibility it provides, the Government has little choice other than to adopt crude, ad hoc method of controlling staff costs. As we become more effective at managing strategically, I believe we will be able to avoid the need for such ad hoc restrictions."
A committee of Secretaries of, Government Departments had completed a series of proposals for reform to be discussed by the Government next month. "The proposals may best be described as a framework setting out the strategic direction which the civil service should follow into the next millennium to meet the many challenges facing the country," said Ms Doyle.