Decentralisation

pvt.joker

"There is also speculation in Leinster House about a review of the Government's decentralisation programme."


http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0708/economy.html


Hopefully the whole damned thing will be shelved

eigrod

pvt.joker wrote: »

"There is also speculation in Leinster House about a review of the Government's decentralisation programme."


http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0708/economy.html


Hopefully the whole damned thing will be shelved

Nope ! They couldn't bring themselves to tell several local TDs that they aint' getting a piece of the pie :

From Lenihan's speech @ http://www.finance.gov.ie/viewdoc.asp?DocID=5370 :

The Government has also decided, in the light of the current Exchequer position, that further expenditure for the acquisition of accommodation for decentralisation will await detailed consideration of reports from the Decentralisation Implementation Group.

Long finger, huh !

Riskymove

They were never gonna come out and say they were scrapping the whole plan, but this means its gonna be on hold for a few years.

I reckon that projects where offices are being built or have been bought will go ahead now bu everything else on long finger

NewDubliner

Today's Sunday Business Post has an article at http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=NEWS+FEATURES-qqqs=news-qqqid=34420-qqqx=1.asp

Some of the lies planted by the spin doctors have taken root:

Given last week’s decision not to commit further funds to acquiring sites, the state has made a profit of more than half a billion euro from the controversial programme.

That's just disposal of assets. It's not a profit.

According to figures prepared by the Department of Finance, just 2,201 of the proposed 10,793 civil servants and public sector workers have so far moved from the capital under the decentralisation plan.

Not many of the 2,201 actually lived or worked in Dublin.

There's no mention of extra people hired to fill vacancies in rural offices or to replace losses in Dublin.

Hotblack Desiato

Editorial in today's Irish Times:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2008/0715/1215940936972.html

Decentralisation halt

THE GOVERNMENT'S announcement of its intention to suspend further expenditure on the acquisition of accommodation for its decentralisation programme was long overdue. Only a fool would buy sites or sign expensive office contracts in a falling property market.

Having originally embarked on a chaotic and uncosted decentralisation programme that envisaged 10,000 civil and public servants moving out of Dublin to 53 locations, there was a reluctance to shout stop. In the end, the worsening state of its finances has come to the Government's rescue.

Last year, having sold €500 million worth of State property, the net cost to the Exchequer for the decentralisation programme and the acquisition of new sites and offices was estimated at €400 million. About 2,000 civil servants had been transferred to 29 towns, some of them from other rural locations. The plan to relocate State agencies had almost ground to a halt.

The decentralisation plan has been a costly, politically-inspired mistake that paid no heed to the Government's own spatial strategy. Nobody would argue against the benefits of a significant relocation of certain administrative Civil Service functions to provincial towns. Those making the voluntary transfer would benefit from a better quality of life, while the extra spending would boost the local economy.

Except only a fool is going to attempt to move home in the current property market so they can decentralise. It'll be people already living outside of Dublin looking for a job closer to home, and who won't be moving house - but this was predominantly the case already. So no extra spending at all to boost anything.

But the exercise should not damage the efficiency of a department or the public services being provided. This is especially important where senior management and executive decision-making are involved. An OECD report has warned the Government against dislocation and fragmentation arising from badly planned decentralisation

The Decentralisation Implementation Group (DIG) has reported good progress in its efforts to transfer clerical staff and administrative functions out of Dublin. But difficulties remain in relation to State bodies. Resistance by technical and professional staff continues. There is also the question of what productive work can be found for senior civil servants who insist on remaining in Dublin. In its report, the DIG noted that the availability of advance and permanent accommodation in provincial areas had been a key driver of the decentralisation programme. Now that the acquisition of properties has been put on hold, there will be time and a valuable opportunity for the Government to assess the ramifications of this contentious programme in light of the concerns expressed by the OECD and by a range of other bodies.

NewDubliner

This in today's Irish Times, Dr Mansergh's defense of the indefensible is quite impressive. He almost sounds socialist.

60 justice employees transfer to Tipperary

SIXTY EMPLOYEES of the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform have been transferred to Tipperary town under the Government's decentralisation programme.....
.....
The Irish Times has learned that most of the jobs in the Tipperary offices have been filled by civil servants moving from other provincial offices, particularly those in Limerick. Out of 55 staff currently based in Tipperary, just two transferred from the capital.

At the ceremony, Dr Mansergh said: "At the risk of shocking some of our metropolitan commentators, who are quite determined not to find a good word to say about it, decentralisation is part of the process of redistributing wealth within this country, and ensuring that the entire resources of this country are not swallowed up meeting the needs of an overcrowded greater Dublin area."

dresden8

Only a fool would buy sites or sign expensive office contracts in a falling property market

Indeed. But they could buy cheap property in a tough market time, just like the rich do.

The real fools buy at the top of the market.

NewDubliner

What will be the impact of the proposed merger of the Human Rights Authority, Data Protection Commissioner and Equality Authority?

The DPC has only recently been gutted and given to Portarlington and the EA is due to be endowed on a needy Roscrea. Not sure if the HR body was promised to anyone. Will they merge and occupy three locations or will staff be forced to relocate once more?

SerialComplaint

NewDubliner wrote: »

What will be the impact of the proposed merger of the Human Rights Authority, Data Protection Commissioner and Equality Authority?

The DPC has only recently been gutted and given to Portarlington and the EA is due to be endowed on a needy Roscrea. Not sure if the HR body was promised to anyone. Will they merge and occupy three locations or will staff be forced to relocate once more?

It's hard to see the logic in including the DPC in this group, as they operate in a totally different area. The only thing they have in common is coming under the Dept Justice umbrella. I understand that National Disability Authority is also slated to join this merger.

Surely they won't roll back on the DPC move to Portarlington? I wonder if the planned moves of the Equality Tribunal & the EA will proceed, or will this be used as an excuse to walk away from these misplanned moves?

SkepticOne

Could the State not save more money outsourcing a lot of these jobs to India rather than to rural areas?

dresden8

SkepticOne wrote: »

Could the State not save more money outsourcing a lot of these jobs to India rather than to rural areas?

It's not about saving money, it's about spending it in marginal constituencies. You haven't been paying attention.

SkepticOne

dresden8 wrote: »

It's not about saving money, it's about spending it in marginal constituencies.

It is about many things. I think it has been acknowledged that savings are involved in moving from a high cost Dublin location to lower cost regional locations. Previous decentralisation plans have been more overtly about cost savings I will grant you that.

The_Conductor

SkepticOne wrote: »

It is about many things. I think it has been acknowledged that savings are involved in moving from a high cost Dublin location to lower cost regional locations. Previous decentralisation plans have been more overtly about cost savings I will grant you that.

It hasn't been acknowledged by anyone, for the simple reason- they have absolutely no idea of the costs involved. No-one has sat down and tried to enumerate the different costs- and weigh them up against the tangible benefits- to see if its worth while. Its purely a political gesture, rather than one that has any founding in economic merit.

irish_bob

smccarrick wrote: »

It hasn't been acknowledged by anyone, for the simple reason- they have absolutely no idea of the costs involved. No-one has sat down and tried to enumerate the different costs- and weigh them up against the tangible benefits- to see if its worth while. Its purely a political gesture, rather than one that has any founding in economic merit.

agree 100 %

Firetrap

That it's a casualty of government cuts says it all. If there was a financial saving to be made by decentralisation, they'd have kept it going.

SerialComplaint

SkepticOne wrote: »

Could the State not save more money outsourcing a lot of these jobs to India rather than to rural areas?

Don't feed the trolls.

CCCP^

ishmael whale wrote: »

No-one ever got rich by wasting money.

The epitaph of the Celtic Tiger and over 10 years of Fianna Fail running the show.

oscarBravo

SerialComplaint wrote: »

Don't feed the trolls.

Don't accuse people of trolling. Read the charter before posting again.

NewDubliner

Ducks agree to decentralisation.

Up to a dozen respected, long-term residents of Leinster House will not be returning to the Dáil when it resumes proceedings after the long summer break.....In what was described as a night of "high drama" involving nets and cardboard boxes, the ducks were successfully removed from Leinster House and relocated to the relative safety of west Dublin.

"The ducklings are thriving in Tymon Park and have integrated very well with the local wildlife,"

Firetrap

Ah but were they technical ducks or clerical grade ducks? Did they get promotions because of their willingness to move? Were the original senior ducks whitewalled by keeping them in a cardboard box til they agreed to move? :pac:

eigrod

Only just came across this article from the Indo.

So, finally some of the disgusting costs of this project are starting to trickle through. €30m for just 3 bodies !!!! What will the overall cost be if this farce is allowed to continue ?

http://www.herald.ie/national-news/three-state-bodies-cost-over-836430m-to-move-office-1454789.html

Three State bodies cost over €30m to move office
By Michael Lavery

Thursday August 14 2008

THE cost of decentralised office space for three Government bodies is now more than €30m.

The final bill is not yet in, as some site costs and temporary interim leases have yet to be worked out, Fine Gael TD Bernard J Durkan has revealed.

The costs for the Department of Finance, the Revenue Commissioners and the Office of Public Works were given in a letter to Mr Durkan from the Dept of Finance.

The figures were "unavailable" last June when Mr Durkan put down parliamentary questions on the issue.

The overall costs, including building and site purchases with fit out, but excluding VAT and fees, total more than €32m, the figures show.

They also reveal:

w The biggest single cost was for a project in Trim, Co Meath, which came to €10.41m;

w the purchase and fit out of a building in Tullamore, Co Offaly, came to €10.034m;

w buying of a site in Trim cost €3.6m;

w a site in Claremorris, Co Mayo, cost €2.5m;

w the fit out of a office in Listowel, Co Kerry, cost €1.3m. The annual rent for the long-term lease is €183,000.

The figures also show that site purchases for offices in Athy, Co Kildare, Kanturk, Co Cork and Kildare, have yet to be "finalised".

A long-term lease for an office in Kilrush, Co Clare, costs €85,000 a year, while the estimated fit out, but excluding VAT and fees, is €411,000.

In Loughrea, Co Galway, the government is paying €139,235, a year in rent for offices which cost another €572,000 to fit out -- but the cost of VAT and fees is not included.

And in Navan, Co Meath, the taxpayer is funding an office at a rent of €382,492 a year while the fit out is costing €1,430,608, again not counting VAT or fees.

Lease

In Athy, Co Kidare, a temporary lease of offices is costing €231,554, a year in rent, while fitting out the offices cost €493,000.

The rent for offices in Newcastle West in Limerick is €68,771 yearly while the cost of a "temporary interim lease" of offices in Naas, Co Kildare, has yet to be agreed.

"Other project costs" include €1,180,000 for offices in Newcastle West and €9,000 for a project in Kanturk, Co Cork and €16,000 for another in Youghal, Co Cork.

Amazingly, the costs for a project in Claremorris, Co Mayo, are listed as "nil".

Non-property costs for the OPW came to €21,621, the figures show.

- Michael Lavery

NewDubliner

eigrod wrote: »

And in Navan, Co Meath, the taxpayer is funding an office at a rent of €382,492 a year while the fit out is costing €1,430,608, again not counting VAT or fees.

This may be the Revenue Commissioners new office in Navan. It's not part of the decentralisation project at all. Ironically, they decided to open an office there because they have many customers in the area and plenty of staff volunteering to work in it.

The fit out cost is an interesting figure. No doubt, it's for for furniture and IT infrastructure and equipment. This kind of cost does not form part of the Government's own estimate of €900m which was for bare buildings only.

Firetrap

From the Sunday Tribune 21st September 2008

OPW calls halt to decentralisation after two people apply for 38 posts

The state body charged with helping to oversee the implementation of decentralisation had to call a halt to plans to move 38 of its own warehouse staff to Claremorris in Co Mayo after it received just two applications for the posts, new documents obtained by the Sunday Tribune have revealed.

Due to a previous decision to allocate the site of the existing warehouse in Dublin to affordable housing, the Office of Public Works also had to seek an alternative Dublin site to meet the "immediate urgent needs" of the office in question, its Central Engineering Workshop.

But despite the government's decision last July to pause the purchase of office accommodation for the decentralisation programme, the Office of Public Works received provisional authorisation later that month to proceed to tender stage for permanent accommodation for 104 other staff at a separate regional office in the town.

In a letter sent to the Department of Finance in May of this year, Vincent Campbell, director of Corporate Services with the OPW, informed the department that it was not in a position to progress plans to locate a warehouse facility for the government's Central Engineering Workshop (CEW) and some Government Supplies Agency (GSA) material.

This would have attracted some 38 posts, he said.

"As there are no applicants, save two, on the CEW/GSA warehouse side of the proposition – OPW is not in a position to progress this element of the proposal at this stage," he said.

NewDubliner

From the Sunday Independent, October 5:

By JOHN DRENNAN

Sunday October 05 2008

Ireland's ill-planned decentralisation debacle may have come to the same shuddering halt as the economy.

But the bills for Charlie Mc Creevy's last folly are set to continue rolling in for another 20 years -- with millions being paid for empty offices.

The rental costs on offices hired to house phantom civil servants in over 30 rural locations -- from Tubbercurry, Co Sligo to Furbo, Co Galway and further afield -- will cost the taxpayer over €67.3m.

"The decision to spend €67m renting office buildings that the State will never own in places no-one has ever heard of and which will house nothing more than imaginary civil servants is the perfect monument to the economic incompetence of this administration," said a Labour party source.

In Kilrush, which is described in tourist guides as being one of Clare's "best kept secrets", the taxpayer will be paying rent to private business interests for property "the State will never own for more than 25 years".

The costliest schemes are Carrick-on-Shannon, Co Leitrim, where the Department of Social and Family Affairs has leased offices at a total cost of €16m, and in Navan, Co Meath, where the Revenue, the property regulator and the Department of Justice have leased offices for €8.8m and €11.5m.

In Carlow, the Department of Enterprise's 20-year lease will cost the taxpayer more than €7.3m whilst in Roscrea, Co Tipperary the Equality Authority Offices will cost the taxpayers over €2m.

Though some office space has been occupied, the current status of the decentralisation project -- where less than 20 per cent of the public sector has moved -- means there are huge swathes of offices across the country that are populated by nothing more tangible than desks and the odd chair.

The figures were given to Labour finance spokesperson Joan Burton in reply to a Dail question.

The article certainly asks some of the right questions but is confused about which offices are fully staffed and which are empty. It also repeats the highly questionable 20% figure which contains a great many jobs that simply moved from one non-Dublin location to another or where the job-holder did not move house (one of the claimed economic benefits of the scheme).

Sand

Decentralisation was the greatest vote buying con in the history of the state. It is to be hoped that as reality impacts on Fianna Fail it will be the first of the cutbacks and will be abandoned..

Its probably a vain hope that their will be criminal investigations into the whole affair. I cant imagine a greater waste of public money for no benefit. It would be interesting to determine the economic links between decentralisation and Fianna Fail supporters.

Dinarius

Sand wrote: »

Decentralisation was the greatest vote buying con in the history of the state.

Not quite........Jack Lynch's removal of domestic rates promise in the 1976 election was. It destroyed local government forever and was, arguably, one of the reasons property went crazy in the last 10 years. If houses were ratable, the market would take a far more measured view of the cost of them.

I cannot see FF openly backing down on decentralisation yet. Not their style. The only bright side to the cost of accommodation over the next 20 years is that it's more than €30m less than the cost of the voting machines, which are probably worth a fraction of what that fool from Waterford made us pay for them.

D.

Firetrap

A big problem with decentralisation, apart from buying up land at inflated prices, is that they were going to have to recruit new staff to fill some of these offices. If they'd pull the plug on this last year, they'd have made money back by selling the sites that are sittting idle all around the country.

Breezer

According to The Irish Times today, any elements of the plan not yet put in place are to be scrapped with a potential saving of €400 million:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2008/1006/1222959411162.html wrote:

The Government is also to abandon the remaining elements of its decentralisation programme as part of the forthcoming budget, with an estimated possible saving of €400 million. Elements of the programme which are already well under way will not be halted.

Now, would it be too much to ask them to listen to the rest of Richard Bruton's ideas while they're at it?

Firetrap

They're still hell-bent on pressing ahead with this, despite everything

Government Announcement of 14 October 2008

Decentralisation: Key projects going ahead

The Government has reviewed the decentralisation programme and identified priority elements on which implementation should proceed at this time. The completion of these projects, coupled with the progress already made, will bring 6,000 public service jobs to over 40 locations outside of Dublin. Details can be found attached in Table A. Decisions on the timing of further work on the remainder of the programme are being deferred pending a review in 2011 in light of budgetary developments.

Having considered the progress made on the human resource aspects of the Programme, commitments already made, the costs involved, the expectations of staff already assigned to decentralising posts and the business readiness of organisations to transfer to the new location in each case, the Government has identified the projects which will continue at this time – see Table A.

The Government has decided to defer further work on implementation of the other elements of the decentralisation programme pending a review in 2011 in light of budgetary developments. These projects are set out in Table B.

A capital expenditure envelope of up to €72m in 2009 and €90m in 2010 will be provided for the acquisition of the property in respect of the projects going ahead.

In reaching its decision the Government had also taken account of (i) the report of the Decentralisation Implementation Group (DIG) on State Agencies and (ii) the views of the Decentralisation Sub-Group of the SMI Implementation Group of Secretaries General.

The DIG and the Department of Finance will give priority to putting in place arrangements for finalising these projects and the Department will be working through the details of these arrangements, in consultation with decentralising organisations and the public service unions as appropriate, on a case-by-case basis.

Link

NewDubliner

Firetrap wrote: »

They're still hell-bent on pressing ahead with this, despite everything

Isn't there an election in 2011? The spin starts in 2010.

Capt'n Midnight

NewDubliner wrote: »

Isn't there an election in 2011? The spin starts in 2010.

What about the local elections ?

Moonbound...

Wanted Wanted Wanted, professionals from all industries and backrounds to establish new political party in Ireland....
Let's be honest it would not take too much effort to do a better job than the jokers we are stuck with...

The rules of joining this new political force in Ireland are; (But not limited to, and please feel free to add to the list)

• You must give your self over completely and without compromise to the service of your country.
• You must be willing to do whatever it takes to build a successful Ireland based on equality for all.
• You must never act selfishly or in the interests of one paticular group.
• You must expect nothing more in return than you give your country.

Revoloution is in the air my friends, be part of it before we all end up paying too high a price for the ineptitude of the present government and un willingness of the opposition to challenge them......

Erin Go Bragh

The_Conductor

Why not just nip down to The Curragh- and gently persuade the army to mount a coup? I'm sure there are more than a few officers more than willing to give it a try at this stage?

NewDubliner

From the Irish Times, 11/11/2008:

The Equality Authority is hit by a double whammy in the Budget. In the decentralisation programme 13 bodies are listed as having an advance party in place, but permanent accommodation is not currently affordable, and no further decentralisation is taking place. The Equality Authority stands alone as the sole organisation listed for decentralisation, where permanent accommodation is not currently affordable. Yet it is required to move 15 of its staff out of Dublin to continue the decentralisation process.

Fifteen Equality Authority staff are already in Roscrea as part of the decentralisation programme. However, this does not mean that 15 existing staff moved from Dublin. As has happened elsewhere under decentralisation, people moved within departments to get the numbers right. Those unable, for family and other reasons, to move from Dublin moved elsewhere within the public service, and were replaced by new people already in or near the decentralised centre.

If few of the existing Dublin-based staff are able to move to Roscrea, which is likely, decentralisation will mean that 15 trained and experienced Dublin-based staff will be replaced in Roscrea by up to 15 staff from elsewhere in the public service with no background in equality legislation and its implementation.

Other than than a bit of extra business for the local Spar, assuming the 15
staff don't bring their own sandwiches, I cannot think of any benefit coming from this move.

We need fewer, bigger, offices that are more cost-effective to manage. This in turn would allow for greater civil-service mobility and flexibility as staff would not need to move from town to follow a career path.

dresden8

NewDubliner wrote: »

From the Irish Times, 11/11/2008:



Other than than a bit of extra business for the local Spar, assuming the 15
staff don't bring their own sandwiches, I cannot think of any benefit coming from this move.

We need fewer, bigger, offices that are more cost-effective to manage. This in turn would allow for greater civil-service mobility and flexibility as staff would not need to move from town to follow a career path.

Don't worry, the staff won't have to worry about decentralisation when they get f*cked out of their jobs. They killed the Celtic Tiger you know.

SerialComplaint

dresden8 wrote: »

Don't worry, the staff won't have to worry about decentralisation when they get f*cked out of their jobs. They killed the Celtic Tiger you know.

Nothing to do with the banks and the property developers then?

The_Conductor

dresden8 wrote: »

They killed the Celtic Tiger you know.

How so?

NewDubliner

SerialComplaint wrote: »

Nothing to do with the banks and the property developers then?

smcarrick wrote:

How so?

I think dresden8 was merely being facetious, in the spirit of the current 'public service is evil' campaign.

By not moving house according to government whim, the public service is, of course, not participating in the housing market churn on which the government has depended.

Hence, they've killed the 'celtic tiger'.

Firetrap

With the current furore over the cervical cancer vaccine and the relatively small cost of implementing it, I'm amazed that there hasn't been a bigger kerfuffle made about decentralisation and the money that's being wasted on it. There are sites lying idle all over the country which cost millions. Some of them don't look like they'll be put to use anytime soon. Everyone seems to hate public servants except when they move to their local town :P

There's a report on decentralisation of stage agencies out now. Some of it makes for shocking reading IMHO. What a disgraceful waste of money.

dresden8

NewDubliner wrote: »

I think dresden8 was merely being facetious, in the spirit of the current 'public service is evil' campaign.

By not moving house according to government whim, the public service is, of course, not participating in the housing market churn on which the government has depended.

Hence, they've killed the 'celtic tiger'.

Jesus, sarcasm is communicated through a lot more than smileys on the internet you know. When I was in school they taught sub-text. And class sizes were bigger, ironically.

Well done New Dubliner, for having a brain.

And, apparently it was our naked greed, not the banks, developers or politicians, that caused the crash.

It's interesting that all the economists who couldn't see what was happening or predict what was going to happen or were conviced there would be a "soft landing" are now full sure in hindsight that it was public servants all along who caused it to happen.

For fuck sake, you got it wrong every step of the way to this point, why is anybody listening to you now?

Pr1cks.

The_Conductor

dresden8 wrote: »

It's interesting that all the economists who couldn't see what was happening or predict what was going to happen or were conviced there would be a "soft landing" are now full sure in hindsight that it was public servants all along who caused it to happen.

For fuck sake, you got it wrong every step of the way to this point, why is anybody listening to you now?

Pr1cks.

On the bright side- at least some of the economists are in the firing line- it would be nice if Austin Hughes and a few other luminaries joined the dole queues........

Note: I wasn't assuming you were being ironic- given some of the totally hairbrained comments and ideas previously expressed on this thread......

dresden8

smccarrick wrote: »

Note: I wasn't assuming you were being ironic- given some of the totally hairbrained comments and ideas previously expressed on this thread......

Forgiven, you Tiger killing functionary, you.

The_Conductor

dresden8 wrote: »

Forgiven, you Tiger killing functionary, you.

Its winter- and with all the energy price rises, I could do with a new coat. Now all I have to figure is how to tan the hides.......

dresden8

smccarrick wrote: »

On the bright side- at least some of the economists are in the firing line- it would be nice if Austin Hughes and a few other luminaries joined the dole queues........

And then they'll be complaining there's not enough staff in the exchange to deal with the huge numbers of unemployed.

That'll be gas.

Dinarius

smccarrick wrote: »

On the bright side- at least some of the economists are in the firing line- it would be nice if Austin Hughes and a few other luminaries joined the dole queues........

Not forgetting that bull-to-end-all-bulls, Bank of Ireland's Dr. (Ahem!) Dan McLaughlin.

A little humility from this lot wouldn't go amiss.

D.

The_Conductor

Dinarius wrote: »

Not forgetting that bull-to-end-all-bulls, Bank of Ireland's Dr. (Ahem!) Dan McLaughlin.

A little humility from this lot wouldn't go amiss.

D.

Particularly in light of the combative mood Brian Goggin et al were in while being interviewed on Morning Ireland this AM. He got EUR5m for running the bank over the past 2 years, and was pretty much admitting that they have identified 1.5 billion of seriously dodgy assets on their books (he dolled this up by saying how impressive it was when they had a loan book totaling almost 144 billion). He also tried to take credit for increasing their tier 1 capitalisation from 4.5% to about 6% (when most of the rest of the EU and the UK are already at well over 8%, and rising)........

Firetrap

From RTÉ 12/11/08

Over €230m spent on decentralisation so far

The Government has spent just over €230m on decentralisation, according to a series of Parliamentary Questions put down by Fine Gael TD John Deasy.

The sum is made up of €220.3m in property costs, and another €11.8m in non-property costs, for locations around the country.

Deputy Deasy said the total of 'close to a quarter of a billion euro' made this an expensive fiasco, and that while some civil servants have moved, this level of expenditure cannot be defended.

The Waterford TD said that some of the property purchased at the height of the boom would never be used for the intended purpose.

In his Budget Speech, Finance Minister Brian Lenihan said the Government had reviewed the decentralisation programme in the light of changed economic circumstances, and had identified 'priority elements' which will proceed as planned.

He said more than 2,500 public service posts had already moved to new locations outside Dublin, and that the priority elements would bring this figure up to 6,000.

The cost to date of €232m equates to €92,800 for each post which has been moved out of Dublin so far.

Click to look at a breakdown of property costs

ART6

I haven't read the many posts in this thread, but I do wonder about the point of trying to relocate civil service departments out of Dublin. Why is it more efficient to have the various departments scattered all around the country when the seat of government is Dublin? Oh, I imagine it would boost politician's expenses no end if they have to go to Sligo or Galway once a week to talk to their functionaries, but efficiency? hardly.

Let's face it, it is another cynical FF ploy to get votes. "Look, we are relocating a whole department to your town. More people spending money in your shops. More income to your council...."

I am not in the public services, but if I was and I was settled in Dublin, I might just suggest they feck off as many other CSs have done. I would not consider myself a tool to be used by FF for their cheap political tricks.

* Cheap??? Not well put ART6*

NewDubliner

From the Irish Times

ANALYSIS: There is only one credible explanation for the budgetary cuts that led to the resignation of the head of the Equality Authority: its valuable work was irritating the Government, writes Carol Coulter

TWO DAYS ago, chief executive of the Equality Authority Niall Crowley, chairwoman of its board Angela Kerins and another board member went to Minister for Justice Dermot Ahern with what they regarded as a modest proposal. It aimed to preserve the core activities of the authority in the light of a proposed cut of 43 per cent to its funding.

The proposal involved retaining as many as possible of its existing staff in what is a complex and technical area of law, where a high level of expertise has been developed over the 10 years of the authority's existence. It also wanted to receive funding to meet current contractual and other obligations.

The key to retaining at least a minimal staff was delaying the rest of the decentralisation to Roscrea. None of the remaining staff in Dublin are in a position to move to Roscrea, so if decentralisation was proceeded with (though the department acknowledges it has no permanent accommodation for the authority), these staff would be lost, to be replaced by others in the public service with quite different expertise.

The Minister has said that the office in Dublin is too expensive, though it will continue to be used by the Government when the Equality Authority leaves. However, Dublin is awash with empty office space, at prices not seen for more than 20 years. A modest office could be found for the remaining staff at relatively little cost.....

Meanwhile, plans are still on course to complete the new Department of Agriculture HQ in Portlaoise, a town much favoured by the Taoiseach.

The_Conductor

NewDubliner wrote: »

Meanwhile, plans are still on course to complete the new Department of Agriculture HQ in Portlaoise, a town much favoured by the Taoiseach.

Timeline changed again though- its now late 2011/early 2012. I can see myself having a 1000 mile weekly roundtrip- as I cannot sell my apartment, the bank won't lend me money for another and the market is awash in rental property....... It would all have worked out so well only 2-3 years ago.......