High-profile State bodies face closure or radical reform

STATE BODIES:MORE THAN 40 State agencies including Bord Bia and the Irish Film Board face radical reform or closure under the wide-ranging proposals set out in the McCarthy report.

It advocates a radical realignment of State bodies to save €170 million a year, including €19 million in capital expenditure.

Some like Bord Iascaigh Mhara (BIM) and Bord Bia would be transferred into the Department of Agriculture, Food and Fisheries, with their expert promotion functions given to a reconstituted Enterprise Ireland.

Others, including the Law Reform Commission, the Irish Film Board, the Family Support Agency and the Western Development Commission, would be scrapped altogether or their functions taken over by other agencies.

The report also recommends consolidating the whole gamut of State support for emerging businesses into Enterprise Ireland.

They include the County Enterprise Boards, Business Innovation Centres, the Western Development Commission and the relevant enterprise and marketing support functions of organisations as disparate as Údarás na Gaeltachta, Shannon Development, BIM, Bord Bia and the Irish Film Board, giving a total annual saving of €10 million.

Scrapping the Irish Film Board, at a potential saving of €3 million a year, would be seen as particularly controversial given its profile and role in nurturing screen talent, along with being an advocate for the Irish film industry.

A spokeswoman for the board said scrapping it would lead immediately to 17 job losses, but thousands more in the industry as the audio-visual sector was worth €557 million to the Irish economy.

The board also believes that its role in providing support to new film-makers could not be replicated by a body like Enterprise Ireland.

The Western Development Commission, which is the statutory agency for the promotion of economic and social development in Donegal, Sligo, Leitrim, Roscommon, Mayo, Galway and Clare, said it was studying the implications of the report.

However, it said its economic development initiatives have been “highly innovative”, and it had provided €4 million in grants to create and sustain 1,200 jobs and 80 enterprises in the western region.

Neither Bord Bia or BIM would comment on the proposals. A statement from Bord Bia said: “The proposals made by the expenditure review group are a matter for the Government to consider, and Bord Bia has no comment to make on them.”

If implemented, the report would also see the Digital Hub Development Agency merge with Enterprise Ireland/IDA at a saving of €1.8 million, while ComReg and the Irish Film Classification Office would become part of the new Broadcasting Authority of Ireland, saving €2 million a year.

Other mergers would include the Health and Safety Authority and the National Employment Rights Authority into one workplace inspectorate with a potential saving of €5 million. The Family Support Agency would save €30 million if closed, the report says. The merger of the Pensions Ombudsman with the Financial Services Ombudsman and the Pensions Board with the Financial Regulator would give savings of €2 million.

The National Roads Authority and the Railway Procurement Agency would be merged with a proposed saving of €3 million, and a single transport safety authority comprising the Road Safety Authority, the Railway Safety Authority, the Maritime Safety Directorate and the Irish Aviation Authority should be examined.

The National University of Ireland (NUI) has disputed the suggestion by the report that closing it would save €3 million a year. NUI registrar Dr Attracta Halpin said it only received €12,700 in direct funding from the State.

The rest came from services it provided to its constituent universities UCD, UCC, NUI Galway and NUI Maynooth.

“The cost of running NUI in 2009 will be €1.3 million. To suggest that if you did away with it that you would save €3 million is a nonsense,” she said.