The impact of decentralisation on the public will be scrutinised by the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Finance and the Public Service, it was decided yesterday.

Organisations will be invited to outline to the committee how decentralisation will effect their day-to-day functioning. They include the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, An Post, the Ombudsman and the National Treasury Management Agency.

Fine Gael's finance spokesman, Mr Richard Bruton, said such a review must steer clear of political divisions, instead attempting to establish if and to what degree services to the public will be disrupted during decentralisation.

Growing scepticism has dogged decentralisation, with many civil servants reported to be unwilling to move from Dublin to the regions. Last month, a number of Government Department secretaries general - the State's top civil servants - raised reservations about plans to relocate 10,000 public servants.

The Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, has ruled out generous compensation for staff agreeing to move out of Dublin.

The committee, which was outlining its agenda for the current session, was urged to examine why the State lagged behind the rest of the EU in electronic payments.

Fianna Fáil's Mr Ned O'Keeffe said the potential savings from a shift to electronic transactions have been long overlooked.