The Minister for Justice's plan to move the Legal Aid Board headquarters from Dublin to his home town of Cahirciveen could mean replacing its entire staff to the detriment of its work, the main union involved has warned.
The Civil and Public Service Union supported the idea of moving a Government department or office to the Co Kerry town, but claimed Mr O'Donoghue had picked the wrong office and had not thought the move through.
The union's general secretary, Mr Blair Horan, said this was the first decentralisation proposal for the transfer of a "whole head office", rather than just the processing operations of larger departments.
Much of the Legal Aid Board's work involved face-to-face meetings, for which its location in Dublin was ideal, he said, adding:
"I can't see a large number of the current staff going to Kerry. And while there'll be no problem finding 40 or 50 people in the Civil Service to go, you could end up with a whole new team in a very specialised office."
Both the CPSU and the board have sought meetings with the Minister, whose spokesman said the talks were likely within the next week or two, before Mr O'Donoghue goes on holidays.
Speaking on RTE 1's lunchtime news yesterday, Mr O'Donoghue defended his decision, saying the Legal Aid Board could operate from anywhere and was "uniquely suited to decentralisation".
He said Cahirciveen had suffered immeasurably from emigration and the move would be a boost to the local economy.
The Minister tacitly admitted that he had championed the proposal, saying the "geographical composition of Cabinet is always a factor" in decentralisation decisions. "But it is by no means the the only factor. There are very sound socio-economic reasons, cogent reasons why this decentralisation should take place."
Mr Horan said that while the decentralisation policy had been a success, there was no co-ordination and insufficient consultation on decisions about which offices to transfer and where. He also noted a precedent for a change of mind by Government, when part of the Department of the Marine was due to be relocated to Kilkenny but the Patents Office went instead.
The Minister had to convince the Legal Aid Board and its client group that the move to Cahirciveen was wise. The union would be putting the case that it supported relocation of a Government office to the town, "but not necessarily this one".
Asked by RTE if the plan was a "done deal", Mr O'Donoghue said the Government had agreed in principle and the Office of Public Works had been asked to identify a site or premises.
He added: "There will be full consultation with the staff unions; no decentralisation will take place without the full consultation of the Legal Aid Board itself."
The board would not comment yesterday, except to confirm it had asked to meet the Minister.