Last week I asked the Taoiseach if it was not the case that the decentralisation programme announced by the then Minister, former Deputy McCreevy, had run aground and the Taoiseach denied it. Three days later he contrived an interview in which he announced the climb-down. This programme was to be the major plank of this Government's term of office and involved the biggest relocation of civil and public servants in the history of the State, and the Taoiseach contrived one of his interviews to say that it will not go ahead as planned.

In any of the number of chat show interviews the Taoiseach gave over the weekend he did not deal with any of the questions that are uppermost in the minds of the civil and public servants concerned and in the 53 venues to which the Government pledged to transfer sections of the civil and public service. As a result of the Taoiseach's climb-down, which venues will not get the Departments, agencies or the civil or public servants that were promised? What is the new deadline for any decentralisation that will proceed? How many of the 10,300 personnel pledged by Mr. McCreevy will still be relocated? How many of the agencies will be relocated? Will any of the specialist staff be relocated?

Is it still the Taoiseach's intention to proceed with the relocation of the policy functions and the heads of policy making in Departments? How much of the 200,000 sq. m. of office space which the Office of Public Works was instructed to procure has been procured? Has the Taoiseach told the Office of Public Works to stop acquiring such space since he announced his climb-down? With regard to the instructions to the OPW to dispose of a similar amount of office space in this city, how is it proposed that will happen given that the people occupying it are not transferring? Does the Taoiseach agree with the Tánaiste who said: "The target will be reached within a very short timeframe and I believe that if we don't reach it quickly the uncertainty that is hanging over the public service will be damaging to the public service and damaging for this Government"?

Is it not time to go back to the drawing board and review a plan that was ill thought out and off the top of the head? It was designed to disperse civil and public servants throughout the country but had little to do with genuine decentralisation or devolution of power. It was never intended to correct regional imbalance and it has now run aground. The Taoiseach has had to climb down on it, which is a major humiliation for the Government. He ought to tell people whose lives have been put on hold precisely who will be transferred and when.

He could not give a date.

I am not sure what interview I gave that could give rise to all those questions.

There were so many.

He cannot remember all of them.

A total of 10,600 civil servants have applied to the central applications facility to relocate. The central applications facility continues to receive new applications every week. It is anticipated interest will increase further as buildings are built and timetables firm up. With regard to property, site acquisition negotiations have been completed in 13 locations, contracts have been received for an additional ten locations and suitable sites have been identified in a further 15 locations. Negotiations to acquire have either commenced or are close to commencement in these locations.

Agreement has been reached on most of the human resource and industrial relations issues and has enabled progress on transfer to staff promotions. Discussions are ongoing in other areas. Movement of staff between Departments and offices is well under way and 1,500 people have already signed up for Departments. All the Departments and offices have produced implementation plans setting out the detailed arrangements they are putting in place for the relocation. The various negotiations with the unions are progressing. In the Civil Service they are far more advanced but there have been difficulties in the agencies. There are some difficulties on the professional side as well.

The point I made in the House last week that we had extended the timescale was made last year at the launch of the implementation report and was written about in many newspapers. What I said a few days ago was that we will not get all this done. It will not be possible to build all the buildings and get everything finished by Christmas. That was my great announcement and I thought it was stating the obvious——

Which year was the Taoiseach talking about?

——but I am sorry if I upset Deputy Rabbitte's weekend and that he thought I would get it finished by Christmas when I replied to him last week. That was not my intention when I replied to him.

The original timescale set for the programme when it was announced was very ambitious. It was to be done within three years, requiring the full and active co-operation of all the parties involved. It has become clear that some issues which surfaced will take a considerable period to resolve. However, setting ambitious targets was the best way to drive the programme forward. If we did not do that, we would not have made so much progress.

All the civil servants in the various areas are moving. We have made some changes along the way. The implementation group has produced a number of reports. Last week it announced that the probation officers would not be decentralised to Navan but that other sections of the Department will be decentralised. There has been a number of such instances. The Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform has proposed that in addition to the headquarters of the probation and welfare service, a number of other organisations will move to Navan, such as the national property service regulatory authority, the coroners agency and a new human resources unit. We have made a number of such announcements where the original staff units have been switched to other units.

There is huge interest in the programme and we will continue to implement it as stated. There is no lack of interest on the part of civil servants but there is on the part of public servants. That is a difficulty we will have to deal with. We will, however, do it in conjunction with the Civil Service unions. I thank them for their patience and diligent work in which they have engaged with us on the programme. It will continue with the Minister for Finance, Deputy Cowen, the Minister of State at the Department of Finance, Deputy Parlon, and the rest of the Government.

At the weekend, I saw the Taoiseach paying tribute to his predecessor, Mr. Haughey. If Mr. Haughey had uttered the misleading statements to the House that the Taoiseach habitually utters, people would have been marching on the streets. I wrote down what the Taoiseach just said. He said, "All the civil servants in the various areas are moving". In what kind of parallel universe is the Taoiseach living? The point is they are not moving. The only items dispersed around the country are electronic voting machines that do not work.

Where are they now?

I listened to a radio interview with the Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs, Éamon Ó Cuív, in which he illustrated the success of the ADM Limited move to Clifden.

The personnel were moved into a hotel.

It turned out that no one from ADM Limited moved to Clifden but that they were new staff there. ADM Limited then issued a statement on the same radio programme, stating it is neither a public service nor Civil Service organisation but an independent board and it is none of the Government's business from where it functions.

We will be correcting that this evening.

Allow Deputy Rabbitte without interruption.

This is the kind of misleading nonsense that is going on.

I ask again, what is the timescale for the decentralisation that will go ahead? Will there be negotiations to ensure whatever transfers take place are voluntary? Last week the Taoiseach said that in an organisation with 100 staff and where 99 were moving, the fellow remaining could not expect to get promotion. Apart from the fact that it is the other way around, what does he mean by the fellow remaining behind cannot get promotion?

Has the Taoiseach put any halt to the gallop of the Minister of State at the Department of Finance, Deputy Parlon, who, no more than himself, would say anything? Is the Minister of State still going around the country, acquiring property in the uncertain climate that the Taoiseach has created for the programme? Will the Taoiseach agree the people who work in the service of the Government deserve to know what the future holds for them? Does he have any regard to the damage done to the coherence of Government by the unique difference in this package of decentralisation that proposes to transfer the policy-making functions of Departments from Dublin city? Has any cost benefit analysis been conducted on the programme? Will we ever see any of the figures involved?

The Deputy's time has concluded.

We will have a situation that has happened to those units already transferred where the specialist staff refuse to move and have to be retained in Dublin city while staff have to be employed. The Government has made commitments to so many towns and villages where there is a definite need to address regional imbalance. These towns do not know whether they will be the beneficiaries of the pledged relocations.

A vote benefit analysis would be better.

We are not going to move civil servants down to offices that do not exist.

That is the Taoiseach's leaf.

Civil servants are well-informed through staff negotiations. I appreciate the work that has gone on for the last two and a half years on these issues. The Civil Service unions have been deeply involved in the discussions. Agreement has been reached on a large number of issues, including human resources. It has enabled progress to be made on a range of issues, including mobility, promotions and discussions of transfers to other areas. As I have already stated, building and site acquisition negotiations have been completed in 13 locations. Contracts have been received for another ten locations. Suitable sites have been identified in a further 15 locations and negotiations to acquire sites have either commenced or are close to commencement.

What about Clifden?

Those civil servants who wish to transfer have made their applications on the central applications facility. Some difficulties have arisen about professional grades, as there were during the last decentralisation round. We will not duplicate the positions but we must negotiate a way through this. It was done before and will have to be done again.

It is not a charge to get civil servants out of Dublin and into caravans. When the sites are available, they will move. It will not be finished by Christmas, but some hundreds of civil servants will have moved by then to the 13 locations.

Difficulties have arisen with the State agencies which have no history of decentralisation and where small numbers of people are involved. I referred to the argument put forward by some outside the House that if some State workers opt to stay in Dublin, they should be automatically promoted. That cannot happen as they must be treated equally. That is the understood position with the Civil Service unions. Where there are difficulties, we will negotiate through them.

I see no difficulty with policy-making units being here, there or anywhere. Some of the largest multinational companies in the world operate in Ireland. With their bases in different parts of the world, they have policy and business meetings through televised conferences. I have addressed some of these meetings. Personnel in these companies can deal with policy in Latin America and the US. To say that because someone is in Nenagh or Sligo, the whole Civil Service system will stop functioning is a statement from the 1930s.

Hear, hear.

There are no difficulties with this issue. Thankfully, Ireland is one of the world's largest exporters of information and communications technology. To believe that in a small island we cannot communicate on policy issues is nonsense.

Would the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children like to comment on this?