Temporary offices will be rented to ensure the Government's plan to move 10,000 public servants out of Dublin begins from January, it has emerged.
The Department of Finance and the Office of Public Works are ready to accelerate the plan, following yesterday's publication of the Decentralisation Implementation Group's first report.
The group, headed by Mr Phil Flynn, said "the vast majority of moves will only take place close to the end" of the Government's end-of-2006 deadline.
Under the Government's plan, private developers will be contracted to provide and maintain offices that will transfer to the State's ownership at the end of the deal. Seven hundred offers of offices, or land, are being whittled down by the OPW. Two or three contenders will be left in each area to ensure the State gets value for money.
The deal will be monitored by the OPW auditors and full information will be released about successful bidders.
Public servants are to be asked to list their preferred locations for decentralisation from one to 10 on a special web register to be set up next month.
In an attempt to encourage officials to come forward, people who register in the first eight weeks will be given preference.
More than 200,000 square metres of office space will be vacated in Dublin over the next three years, although the State may have to hold onto empty offices for a time.
Each decentralised Department will maintain a small office near the Dáil - but all senior officials will have to transfer, rather than staying in Dublin.
The Flynn report said: "Concerns have been expressed that Ministers will, in reality, continue to operate largely in Dublin and this may lead to the establishment of Dublin-based "cabinets" and the appointment of more political advisers, thus undermining the long established role of civil servants in policy formulation."
It went on: "Contrary to some media suggestions there is no question of these Departments retaining an Aireacht, or policy centre, in Dublin."
Speaking at the launch of the report, the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy said: "I want to make it clear that this programme will be delivered in its entirety.
"There is no question of reconsidering the scale of the programme. There is no question of omitting certain elements of the programme either because of the location or numbers involved," he said.
Meanwhile, the Minister has accepted recommendations to include the transfer of 835 information technology workers and 500 health staff in the plan.
The Minister had specifically excluded both of these groups when he announced the decentralisation decision in the last December's Budget.
The IT staff should be moved to a cluster of three, as yet unchosen, towns "within 20 to 30 miles of each other" to operate from two new world-class data centres. The ESB has already been involved to advise on possible locations, since data centres use even more electricity than most large factories.
Eight departments, along with the Office of Public Works, are to be decentralised to 53 locations in 25 countries, involving 10,300 officials.
However, the Flynn group said that tens of thousands of officials would have to move to new jobs in order to bring the plan about. Problems will be created when technical, professional grades want to move to places where only general grade jobs are available.
"Such case will raise questions around conditions of service, pension and tenure, as well as legal issues relating to appointments to the Civil Service," said the report.
