As Ireland approaches the centenary of governing itself, Mark Callananponders how public services need to reform in the light of long-term challenges ahead
By 2022, Ireland will be celebrating 100 years of self-rule. The recently launched Public Service 2022 project was designed to consider what kind of Ireland could exist by then, and to identify things on the horizon that we need to be thinking about and preparing for now. The idea behind the project was to examine trends and drivers of change within the public services over the coming years, as well as identifying choices that lie ahead and preparing us for the challenges we may face.
A number of issues emerged as critical in terms of how Ireland and public services may evolve.
A number of key challenges will face successive governments over the next 15 years in coping with dramatic demographic changes, from an increasing population, to the integration of the new Irish into society, to dealing with an ageing population. A related issue is where people will choose to live - current projections are that two million out of five million people in the State will live in the greater Dublin area by 2022, and this will pose enormous challenges for service delivery nationally.
There is also the wider picture of globalisation and the challenge from emerging economies such as China and India. The ways both the economy and societal values evolve are seen as exercising a key influence on whether more or less government will be required. The pace of change in both technology and the environmental field is accelerating rapidly and will be critical.
Many expect that there will be a greater role for the private and voluntary sectors in delivering what were previously seen as public services. However, it may also be that new challenges may emerge that require a co-ordinated government-led response.
Of course, decisions about how we respond to challenges over the next 15 years will ultimately be made by the government of the day. Nevertheless, there are a number of things that were identified through the project that could be done to enhance the capacity of the public service to respond to change.
Firstly, greater flexibility needs to be given to those at local level at the "front line" of service delivery, especially in terms of social services. Relying on "one size fits all" approaches will be less effective in our more diverse and ageing society. Some flexibility will be needed so that services can be adapted to meet the needs of particular groupings of people within different communities and localities.
Secondly, as a nation we must start questioning the assumption that the solution to every problem is a new agency. Of course in many areas agencies are very effective in dealing with well-defined and relatively self-contained matters, and allow for the development of specialisation and a more professional service. However, while agencies, many of which were established in recent years, are usually set up with the best of intentions, we now have some 600 agencies and there is a strong case for consolidation or rationalisation. The institutional sprawl makes it more difficult to provide coherent services and the public is confused as to where to access them.
Thirdly, the public service needs to assert its place as a primary source of evidence-based policy advice to politicians. Ministers receive advice from a range of sources, such as political parties, the social partners, interest groups, through the media etc. That is part of the functioning of a modern democracy. However, there is also a need to ensure that the public service, in particular senior civil servants, retain the ability to provide Ministers with impartial advice in the long-term interests of society. This advice must be based on a greater capacity to evaluate policy options, and linked to actual experience of implementation on the ground.
Fourthly, there is a need for clearer lines of accountability for performance, in the light of increasing demands to hold both political and administrative actors to account for decisions. This may mean a greater visibility and presence for senior public servants in public discourse (as there already is for some parts of the public service).
Lastly, we need to get down to tackling certain "rigidities" within the public sector, which have been largely untouched by reforms carried out to date. For example, we are in many parts of the public service still largely working within grade-based hierarchies and structures that have their origin in the nineteenth century - and a trades union structure to match and reinforce this. There is only very limited interchange of personnel between different parts of the public service, and between public and private. Innovation goes unrewarded, and poor performers tend to be sidelined into positions where they can "do no harm" - this acts as a festering sore for the majority of public servants who do an excellent and professional job.
Contrary to what many might expect, Ireland's public services rate highly compared with other countries, and many worthwhile reforms have been introduced. That is not to suggest that there is no room for improvement - there clearly is.
We have a window of opportunity to make some of these improvements before we reach our 100th anniversary of governing ourselves.
Dr Mark Callanan is a lecturer with the Institute of Public Administration, Dublin, and editor of Ireland 2022: Towards One Hundred Years of Self-Government