The 50 Department of Agriculture clerical staff who will be transferred to Portlaoise in the next few weeks are all volunteers and were not taken from the so-called "CAO" list as part of the Government's decentralisation plan, it emerged yesterday.
The Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, travelled to Portlaoise yesterday to be with the Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh, to announce the first transfer of staff since the unveiling of his decentralisation plan.
Mr Walsh said 50 staff would be moved to Portlaoise in the coming weeks to carry out work related to the introduction of the Single Payment Scheme to farmers.
Both Ministers denied that this was an election stunt to show that the plan was working, but they admitted that the clerical staff had been seeking transfers to Portlaoise and were not coming off the official transfer list.
Civil servants, Mr McCreevy said, had been given a form in recent weeks which he said was like a "CAO-type application" setting out preferences on where they would like to transfer to.
Mr McCreevy said the people who returned those forms first would get preferential treatment as part of the overall plan.
He said it was untrue to say that there was total opposition to the decentralisation plan from the trade union movement.
Some of the unions were keeping an open mind on the issue because it would suit some of their members, he said.
"In 10 years' time people will be wondering what all the fuss was about."
Mr McCreevy said the Department of Agriculture was "blazing a trail" which he looked forward to others following.
Mr Walsh told a press conference that when the 50 staff transferred to Portlaoise, which was chosen by Mr McCreevy as the new headquarters for the Department, the total number of Department staff there would be almost 300.
"Further transfers will continue on a phased basis until the decentralisation process is finalised, bringing the total staff numbers in Portlaoise to 650," the Minister said.
He added that to facilitate the swift transfer of staff, the Office of Public Works would be providing interim office accommodation because of the urgency involved in getting the workers there.
The Department of Agriculture staff will be compiling details of the Single Payment Scheme, under which every farmer in the country will receive payments from January next.
This means a total of 130,000 farmers will have the right to query the amount of payment before then.
Most Department of Agriculture staff are already based outside Dublin. Fewer than 1,000 of the 4,200 total work in the capital.