I thank Deputy Farrell. I will set out the number of salary proposals approved by the relevant Ministers to which I have consented. I have consented to 23 proposals following the approval of the relevant Minister.
There were 11 proposals from the Minister for Transport, in relation to Iarnród Éireann, Bus Éireann, Bus Átha Cliath, CIÉ, the Dublin Port Company, the Shannon Airport Group, the Port of Waterford, the Po…
TDs / Jack Chambers
Jack Chambers
Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation
Portrait: © Houses of the Oireachtas (Oireachtas (Open Data) PSI Licence) · source file
0
questions asked
Members of the Government answer questions rather than ask them
152,394
words spoken in the chamber
146,472 as a minister, 5,922 as a TD
358
votes recorded
Each Yes, No or Abstained in a recorded vote
From the Dáil chamber only: committee meetings are not in this archive.
Members of the Government answer parliamentary questions rather than ask them, so this page lists none of theirs.
Month by month
Low months are usually recesses, when the Dáil does not sit. The archive runs to 22 October 2026.
Contributions to debates 720 in all
Dec 2024Oct 2026
Show as a table
| Month | Contributions |
|---|---|
| December 2024 | 0 |
| January 2025 | 0 |
| February 2025 | 57 |
| March 2025 | 2 |
| April 2025 | 36 |
| May 2025 | 52 |
| June 2025 | 2 |
| July 2025 | 90 |
| August 2025 | 0 |
| September 2025 | 0 |
| October 2025 | 11 |
| November 2025 | 109 |
| December 2025 | 69 |
| January 2026 | 1 |
| February 2026 | 44 |
| March 2026 | 0 |
| April 2026 | 37 |
| May 2026 | 44 |
| June 2026 | 1 |
| July 2026 | 60 |
| August 2026 | 0 |
| September 2026 | 80 |
| October 2026 | 25 |
Debates they spoke in most
Plus 658 contributions in the regular slots, such as Leaders' Questions and Priority Questions. Speech from the chair is not counted.
Party, constituency and offices
- constituency Dublin West 29 November 2024 to now
- party Fianna Fáil 29 November 2024 to now
- office Minister for Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform 23 January 2025 to 4 June 2025
- office Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation 5 June 2025 to now
The context here is that the proposals are submitted by the board of a respective commercial State body to the relevant line Department, setting out the proposed new salary and supporting rationale. This is robustly interrogated by the relevant line Department, which undertakes an assessment of the proposal. Then the relevant line Minister subsequently considers the board's recommendation, the Department's analysis a…
The Deputy is conflating different issues. The facts speak for themselves in terms of the public pay talks. We did have engagement with trade unions in June and we wanted to sit down around the table. I am not going to go over all of that now except to say I welcome the fact that we are engaging at the WRC.
This was a systematic review. It was undertaken independently of the Government. It proposed a structure of up…
I thank Deputy Nash. Public expenditure must be managed to maximise value for money for the taxpayer and support the delivery of Government priorities within the voted allocations. Achieving value for money in public expenditure is a key Government priority. Over the past two years, a number of initiatives have been introduced to strengthen the focus on value for money and to drive efficiencies across the public serv…
I reject the conclusion the Deputy has come to, except to say that the work of the task force is to complement rather than replace the wide range of policy and expenditure analysis undertaken and published annually by Departments. Departments will remain responsible for conducting detailed policy analysis and expenditure evaluations within their respective sectors. I have asked officials to establish this task force …
I will set out all of the detail when that is concluded within my Department. As I said, it will be established within that three-month period.
The Deputy referenced the health system. Of course there are examples of opportunities, such as the work that the Minister, Deputy Carroll MacNeill, is doing on agency banks to get conversions by having staff banks. That would be a better use of public money than some of the…
We will set out and be transparent about the terms of reference and membership when they have been decided.
Budget 2027 builds on the sustained investment provided by the Government over recent years to support household living standards. It focuses on providing a package of permanent tax and expenditure measures, including broad-based and targeted changes. This will deliver sustained improvements in living standards, greater certainty for households and enhanced supports for more vulnerable households.
In relation to soc…
My colleagues and the Tánaiste in the Department of Finance made the decision around what was possible in the taxation of home heating oil. One has to look at all the measures in the round, including the interventions we made on fuel allowance and all the other rate changes targeting the cost of living as a specific issue, in particular for low-income groups.
My Department and the Department of Finance model the imp…
We did make progress and specified a lot of priority in the social protection package for child poverty.
The child support payment and the working family payment have increased. The Minister of State, Deputy Butler, has taken measures with respect to early invention for youth mental health services. Youth diversion programmes have received increased funding with respect to the Department of education and the Departm…
I thank Deputy Farrell for the question. The Government remains fully committed to collective bargaining as the established mechanism for addressing pay and related matters in the public service. This approach has provided an effective basis for engagement over many years and has supported agreements that balance the interests of public servants, service users and the wider public. The contribution made by public ser…
What the Deputy has said is not correct. It is well documented publicly that there were two engagements between officials in my own Department and trade unions in June, in advance of the previous agreement concluding, at which we sought to construct a new agreement. Following those discussions, trade unions made a decision to ballot for industrial action. As they were balloting for industrial action, a process that c…
I thank the Deputy. I appreciate her remarks on that. I have seen some of the concern reflected by the INMO and by the student nurses who are graduating. My understanding is that many student nurses have actually received contracts and have been employed. I do not have the latest data on how many are still awaiting a contract. It is important to say that when we set up regional structures, they plan for the recruitme…
In line with the Better Public Services transformation strategy 2030, the Department recognises that access to specialist expertise is essential to a high-performing civil and public service, particularly as we respond to increasingly complex challenges in areas such as policy development and evaluation, economics, infrastructure, procurement, digital and data, and major project delivery. Our focus is on ensuring tha…
I will give a tangible example. There is a lot of tracking going on. There has been significant uptake of digital and AI training. We have a lot of data, which I can send to the Deputy. I am particularly monitoring the digital and AI piece, where we know the numbers going through the IPA because it is a priority to upskill and reskill within the public service. I agree that we need to better utilise our internal work…
That is a fair question. I was previously a Minister of State in the Department of Transport. When you see the organisational structure of both Transport Infrastructure Ireland and the National Transport Authority, there is a significant bank of expertise and specialisation in those agencies, which were stood up at the time not only to provide that specialist expertise to advise the Government but also to provide tha…
I thank the Deputy and the other Deputies who have submitted questions. I propose to take Questions Nos. 10, 12, 16 and 18 together.
As the Deputy knows, a group was appointed by the Government on Friday to undertake a focused and intensive exercise with the parties aimed at constructing a basis for formal negotiations at the Workplace Relations Commission, WRC. Following positive engagement between the Government a…
Our record is clear. If you take the previous public service agreement from 2024 to 2026, we delivered cumulative pay improvements of 9.6% compared with cumulative inflation of 6.6%. That was achieved through the collective bargaining process and demonstrates the established framework can and does deliver real benefits for public servants. We want to ensure we have a new pay agreement that is fair and equitable for p…
I thank both Deputies for their comments. That was not what held it up. There were preliminary discussions and there was then a process of balloting for industrial action rather than continued discussions. I can only speak to the previous agreement and Deputy Stanley raised the issue of the lowest paid. That was an important piece of the last agreement and previous agreements too but talks are under way with respect …
I thank Deputy Moynihan for the question.
My Department is supporting the responsible and effective adoption of AI across the public service to enhance service delivery while safeguarding public trust. The guidelines provide public service bodies with a practical framework for designing, developing and deploying AI ethically, transparently and consistently with public service values. The guidelines are based on seve…
It is interesting that the scope of the interest, activation and user uptake is very high. I am bringing a memo to the Government on this in the coming weeks, but to give an example, my Department is supporting the Institute for Public Administration's digital academy, which offers digital data and AI learning pathways for the public service in 2027.
This will build significantly on the estimated 20,000 staff that h…
It is important to see it in a positive context. We have announced measures around AI skills, which the Minister, Deputy Lawless, is leading on but that applies to the public sector as well. We want to see opportunities for upskilling and reskilling, and that is happening, as we can see in the uptake with the IPA. There are some other cases apart from the ones referenced by the Deputy. There are huge opportunities in…
I move amendment No. 1:
To delete all the words after "Dáil Éireann" and substitute the following:
"recognises that:
— public servants make a vital contribution to the delivery of public services across the State; and
— the best means of securing improvements in pay and conditions is through negotiation and agreement, thereby avoiding disruption to public services and to those who rely on them;
notes that:
— th…
Réamhrá
Agus an Tánaiste agus mé féin ag cur buiséad 2027 i láthair don Teach, déanann muid é sin ó bhonn láidir. Ní féidir an bonn láidir sin a thomhas trí staitisticí eacnamaíocha amháin, áfach. Tá sé le fáil i gcumas agus in uaillmhian ár ndaoine óga, sa neart atá inár gcuid pobal ar fud na tíre agus i sochaí a bhfuil athrú thar na bearta tagtha uirthi ach ina mothaítear go láidir fós gur cheart seasamh le chéile…
This will provide: an extra €21.6 million for water quality and biodiversity European innovation partnerships, to improve water quality on farms and support farmers; €22 million for the national sheep welfare scheme; €8.4 million for animal health and welfare policies, including horse and greyhound welfare measures and the animal welfare strategy; a €4 million increase for the straw incorporation measure, to support …