Institutional Structure.
8. (1) There is hereby established an Office to be known as the Central Statistics Office to exercise the functions conferred on it by this Act.
(2) The Director General appointed under section 12 of this Act shall be responsible for the management and control of the Office.
(3) There shall be a National Statistics Board which with the agreement of the Taoiseach shall have the general function of guiding the strategic direction of the Office.
Functions of Office.
10.(1) The functions of the Office shall be the collection, compilation, extraction and dissemination for statistical purposes of information relating to economic, social and general activities
and conditions in the State.
(2) The Office shall have authority to co-ordinate official statistics compiled by public authorities to ensure, in particular, adherence to statistical standards and the use of appropriate classifications.
(3) The Office shall have authority to assess the statistical potential of the records maintained by public authorities and, in conjunction with them, to ensure that this potential is realised in so far as resources permit.
The Director General of the Central Statistics Office.
12.(1) The Director General of the Office shall be appointed by the President on the nomination of the Taoiseach.
(2) The Director General shall be a corporation sole by the name of the Director General of the Central Statistics Office with perpetual succession and a seal and may sue or be sued by that name.
(3) The person holding the office of Director General shall be a civil servant of the State.
(4) The Director General shall hold office on such terms and conditions as may be determined by the Taoiseach after consultation with the Minister for Finance.
(5) The Taoiseach shall be the appropriate authority for the purpose of the Civil Service Commissioners Act, 1956, and the Civil Service Regulation Acts, 1956 and 1958, in relation to the Director General.
Independence on Statistical Matters.
13.The Director General shall have the sole responsibility for and be independent in the exercise of the functions of deciding -
(a) the statistical methodology and professional statistical standards used by the Office;
(b) the content of statistical releases and publications issued by the Office; and
(c) the timing and methods of dissemination of statistics compiled by the Office.
Management Board of the Central Statistics Office
Terms of Reference
1. Management Board Roles and Function
The Management Board will act as the primary decision making committee within the Central Statistics Office.
a) The Management Board will provide the leadership and management required at a corporate level in the CSO;
b) The Management Board will set the vision and strategic direction for the organisation, taking into account, as far as possible, customer, staff and all other relevant stakeholder views. In particular the Management Board will work to turn the vision and strategy into a suite of tangible actions that will result in the implementation of the strategy. Evaluation of performance against those stated objectives will be a key function for the Management Board to ensure that where necessary the appropriate action is taken to ensure that targets are achieved;
c) The Management Board will evaluate the vision at appropriate intervals, if necessary carrying out amendments, based on evidence and experience to that point;
d) The Management Board, guided by the National Statistics Board (NSB), will provide the appropriate leadership to the development of the broader Irish Statistical System;
e) The Management Board will ensure, by delegating and assigning responsibility and accountability to the appropriate person(s):
f) The Management Board will monitor the performance of the CSO and ensure that the vision and strategies put in place are designed to continually improve the performance of the organisation, teams and individuals.
g) The Management Board will ensure that staff are supported to achieve their full potential. The Management Board will ensure that staff resources are allocated in the most cost effective and efficient manner possible;
h) The Management Board will manage the CSO budget at a corporate level and ensure that financial resources are effectively managed;
i) The Management Board will monitor developments both nationally and internationally that may impact on the statistical environment;
j) The Management Board will ensure that appropriate governance structures and mechanisms are in place in the CSO. The Management Board may delegate decision making on specific subjects to individuals or groups within the CSO as necessary. Such delegation should be clearly indicated in terms of reference given by the Management Board to the individuals or groups in question. The current governance’s structures are laid out in Appendix A.
k) Operational responsibility and accountability for the performance of different domains within the organisation, and implementation of cross-cutting corporate decisions and initiatives lies with ADGs/DIR and the relevant Heads of Division (HoDs) as outlined in assignments and responsibilities made by the Director General (DG) under the Public Service Management Act 1997.
None of the above supersedes the authority and accountability of the DG, as defined in the Statistics Act, Public Service Management Act and other legislation which governs the work of the Office. The DG has the authority to take decisions independently of the Management Board.
2. Membership
The Management Board will comprise the:
The Office of the Director General will provide secretarial support to the Management Board and will attend the meetings.
3. Guiding Principles
a) The interests of CSO, its customers and its staff, are paramount in the activities and decision making role of the Management Board;
b) The Management Board is conscious of the role it has to play in shaping the culture of the organisation and, the Management Board by its own actions and behaviour will provide the appropriate leadership in this regard;
c) The Management Board is committed to continuous development as a core principle for the organisation and will strive to ensure that the organisation continues to review and evaluate its performance with a view to continual development;
d) Within the Management Board a strong culture of independent and challenging thinking and a diversity of opinion is encouraged. Management Board decisions are ultimately owned and supported by all Management Board members, notwithstanding personal perspectives;
e) The decision making role of the Management Board will, to the extent possible, be heavily informed by evidence based argumentation. The Management Board will be supported in its decision making role by other personnel and groups in the organisation as appropriate to different subjects;
f) The Management Board is committed to the principles of responsibility and accountability in the performance of its functions;
g) The Management Board is committed to open communication and follow through on decisions taken to ensure consistent implementation across the organisation.
4. Meetings:
The Management Board will meet on a weekly basis. At a minimum the first Management Board meeting of each month will be a face to face meeting. The meetings will be chaired by the Director General or a person to whom this function has been delegated by the DG.
The MB meetings will move between the three locations of the office.
For MB meetings to proceed a quorum of 3 members is required.
5. Agenda and Documents
a) Agenda items for Management Board can be put forward by any member of the Management Board or SMG. Proposals from SMG member must be submitted through the appropriate Assistant Directors General/Director. The Board will discuss the agenda for the next meeting as a standing item on the MB agenda. The agenda will close two working days prior to the Management Board;
b) All documents put forward must incorporate a front page which gives a brief outline of the issue for discussion/decision and state exactly what the Management Board is being asked to discuss or decide;
6. Communications
The minutes of all Management Board meetings will be posted once formally adopted by the Management Board.
Decisions and action items will be clearly communicated and the Management Board will take an active role in ensuring that Heads of Division are briefed on all actions and decisions taken by the Management Board.
7. Confidentiality of Proceedings
The proceedings (e.g. individual views expressed by Management Board members during meetings) of Management Board meetings will remain confidential at all times.
8. Review TOR
The TOR will be reviewed on an annual basis.
| Corporate Governance Assurance Statement 2016 | ||||||||||||||
| Please complete the CGAS template below which includes an area on Corporate responsibilities, a section on management assurance on internal control (Section 1), a section on the assessment of corporate management controls (Section 2 A- F) and a section on the action plan to improve compliance with corporate management controls (Section 3). For your convenience the template includes links to general guidance, policy documents, office notices and home pages. There is scoring guidance for each section at the top of each section A-F. | ||||||||||||||
| Corporate Responsibilities | ||||||||||||||
| Head of Division: | Period covered: | 1/1/2016 -31/12/2016 | ||||||||||||
| Division: | Date signed: | |||||||||||||
| Please include your division’s function as identified in the relevant table in the July 2016 Assignment of Responsibilities document . | ||||||||||||||
| Function of the Division | ||||||||||||||
| Please complete the table below detailing the outputs you have responsibility for | ||||||||||||||
| Main Outputs (i.e. Surveys/Processes/Projects) | ||||||||||||||
| Section 1: Management Assurance on Internal Control | ||||||||||||||
| As the Head of Division responsible for the above named area, I confirm to the best of my knowledge that my staff have knowledge of the CSO’s policies and procedures in relation to corporate responsibility, quality management and assurance, information assurance and security (data management), project management/EU contracts, procurement management and staff management in fulfilling their appointed roles and tasks. I attach an assessment of the framework within my area. I recognise that all systems of internal control are designed to manage, rather than eliminate risk and can therefore only provide reasonable and not absolute assurance of effectiveness. | ||||||||||||||
| Head of Division: | Date: | |||||||||||||
| Section 2: Assessment of Corporate Management Controls | ||||||||||||||
| Current Level of Compliance | ||||||||||||||
| Corporate Management Controls | Full | Substantial | Partial | None | Unaware | Not Applicable | ||||||||
| Section 2 A. Corporate Responsibilities | Section 2 A Scoring Guidance | |||||||||||||
| A1. All staff in my division are aware of their responsibilities in relation to confidentiality under the Statistics Act 1993 and as Officers of Statistics. | ||||||||||||||
| A2. All requirements arising from EU regulation that I have responsibility for have been met or where issues are outstanding they have been properly documented, discussed with my direct manager and communicated to Eurostat/ECB. | ||||||||||||||
| A3. I have put arrangements in place to ensure that all risks and issues, including programme and project risks have been identified, assessed, recorded, regularly reviewed and managed in accordance with Office Notice 07/2016. | ||||||||||||||
| A4. Agreed recommendations resulting from either internal or external audits, Peer Reviews, Eurostat visits, or from the C&AG’s Office have been acted upon and there are no audit findings outstanding for more than 12 months. | ||||||||||||||
| A5. The Statutory Instruments (SI) in my division have been reviewed and updated as appropriate. No SI’s have expired without examination and the CSO website is up to date regarding SI’s for my area. | ||||||||||||||
| A6. The Timeliness Monitor has been reviewed regularly and any changes to the international standards or the internal CSO standard were updated on the monitor and on the weekly metrics for MB. | ||||||||||||||
| A7. All applications for access to RMF’s have been dealt with in a timely manner and in line with the policy and procedure as set out in updated Office Notice 06/2011. | ||||||||||||||
| 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |||||||||
| Section 2 B. Quality Management and Assurance | Section 2 B Scoring Guidance | |||||||||||||
| B1. Quality reports are available for all outputs on the CSO website and have been reviewed within the last 12 months. | ||||||||||||||
| B2. Processes for the production and/or publication of all statistical outputs are documented and stored on Lotus Notes. This documentation includes service level agreements, process maps, lists of databases created and used and the location where they are stored. | ||||||||||||||
| B3. I have held liaison meetings with key users in the last year to assess and review their needs. | ||||||||||||||
| B4. Staff in my division are aware of their responsibilities relating to End User Computing standards as set out in the 2011 guidelines - CSO End-User Computing Standards. | ||||||||||||||
| B5. Staff in my division are complying with their responsibilities regarding adherence to SAS best practice standards SAS EBI - Standard Development & Programming Standards. | ||||||||||||||
| B6. Staff in my division are aware of and comply with the Revisions Policy for CSO Statistics. | ||||||||||||||
| B7. Data in my division is compared to other releases and areas for consistency and action is taken to address any inconsistencies identified. | ||||||||||||||
| B8. I have reviewed who has access to electronic data in my division and have attested to my data holdings and the appropriate access by staff to this data using the Office Data Management software. | ||||||||||||||
| B9. Staff in my division are aware of their responsibilities relating to Data Management standards as set out in Office Notice 11/2016. | ||||||||||||||
| 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |||||||||
| Section 2 C. Information Assurance and Security (Data Handling) | Section 2 C Scoring Guidance | |||||||||||||
| C1. Data was handled in accordance with Office Notice 09/2009 on the Disposal of Confidential Paper Records. | ||||||||||||||
| C2. Data was handled in accordance with Office Notice 12/2013 Policy on Retention and Secure Disposal of Statistical Returns and Storage Media. | ||||||||||||||
| C3. Data under my control is managed in accordance with the CSO Data Management Policy with regard to security, confidentiality and data protection. | ||||||||||||||
| C4. My division fulfils its requirement to update the CSO’s public register of Data Matching Activities on a quarterly basis. | ||||||||||||||
| C5. Where there was a known data breach it was reported in line with the procedures as set out in Office Notice 7/2011. (N/A for no data breach) | ||||||||||||||
| C6. I confirm that all staff in my division have taken the necessary steps to ensure ongoing compliance with the CSO Code of Practice on Statistical Confidentiality. | ||||||||||||||
| C7. Staff in my division, including contractors, are aware of and comply with the personnel and physical security policies as stated in Office Notice 26/2014. | ||||||||||||||
| C8. The aggregate or clean data set for each of the current SAS outputs produced in my division have been lodged in the Corporate Data Vault. | ||||||||||||||
| C9. The CSO website’s Pre-release access page is correct for my division. | ||||||||||||||
| C10. I confirm that all relevant staff in my division have read and are aware of the rules and procedures in relation to the CSO Policy on Official Statistics and Data Protection. | ||||||||||||||
| 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |||||||||
| Section 2 D. Project Management/EU Contracts | Section 2 D Scoring Guidance | |||||||||||||
| D1. My staff are aware that all programmes and projects listed above should have been project managed in accordance with best practice guidelines as set out on the Project Management Home Page. | ||||||||||||||
| D2. EU contract grant agreements entered into, in my division, have been above the €50,000 threshold. Where a contract has been entered into, we are compliant with office policies i.e. Office Notice 16/2009 CSO Procurement Policy & Office Notice 01/2016 Interim Revision of CSO Procurement Policies . | ||||||||||||||
| D3. The Work Support System has been used by all staff to record their hours for all EU Contracts. | ||||||||||||||
| 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |||||||||
| Section 2 E. Procurement Management | Section 2 E Scoring Guidance | |||||||||||||
| E1. Staff complied with procurement procedures as set out in Office Notices 16/2009 CSO Procurement Policy and Office Notice 01/2016 Interim Revision of CSO Procurement Policies. | ||||||||||||||
| E2. All non-competitive procurement processes over €25,000 were referred to Internal Audit before any contract was signed. | ||||||||||||||
| E3. My division has supplied information to the ICT Liaison Officer in a timely fashion in line with the terms of Department of Finance circular 02/2016 | ||||||||||||||
| 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |||||||||
| Section 2 F. Staff Management | Section 2 F Scoring Guidance | |||||||||||||
| F1: The DAPs and LBPs are clearly linked to the goals as set out in the latest Statement of Strategy and in CSO 2020. | ||||||||||||||
| F2. All staff were involved in the development of the LBP and DAPs with at least one section meeting held a year at the time of the development of the LBP. | ||||||||||||||
| F3. I actively manage performance of staff in my area and ensure staff have a sufficient and challenging workload | ||||||||||||||
| F4. Staff in my division have completed the 2016 skills register and maintain a CPPD log where relevant. | ||||||||||||||
| F5. My time and attendance records and those of my immediate reports are maintained in line with Office policies. | ||||||||||||||
| F6. I hold regular meetings with my staff and ensure that they are fully informed and engaged with the work of the section. | ||||||||||||||
| F7. Staff fully support the CSO values as set out in CSO 2020 and these values inform their work and behaviour. | ||||||||||||||
| F8. Role Profile forms are completed and interim and annual reviews are carried out in a timely manner. PMDS is up to date in my division. Role profile form goals are grade appropriate in my area. | ||||||||||||||
| 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |||||||||
| Section 3: Action Plan to improve Compliance with Corporate Management Controls | ||||||||||||||
| The table below lists all Corporate Management Controls that my division is not fully compliant with (i.e. B1, F2). Actions will be completed within six months. | ||||||||||||||
| CMC Number (i.e. F1, C2) | Planned Action to Improve Management Controls | Expected level of compliance within 6 months | ||||||||||||
| Partial | Substantial | Full | ||||||||||||
