Sinn Féin spokesperson on Equality, Integration and Law Reform, Pa Daly TD, has expressed his concerns about resourcing within the Data Protection Commission (DPC).

This comes following a response to a parliamentary question, which revealed a large underspend within the Data Protection Commission’s budget for 2020.

Teachta Daly said:

“According to the Minister for Justice, €4.7 million of the Justice Vote Group’s overall €37.6 million underspend for 2020 is accounted for by the Data Protection Commission.

“This is due to a ‘slower than expected take on of additional staff, due to the requirement to move recruitment completely online during 2020’.

“Although it is understandable that Covid-19 has affected recruitment, this is a very large miss in terms of budgetary underspend.

“I am worried that at a time when we need the DPC to be better resourced to process the numerous complaints it gets, it is struggling to spend even what it has been allocated.

“The Oireachtas Justice Committee recently heard about how the lack of resources the DPC has may compromise Ireland’s economic competitiveness, as well as leading to large delays in the processing of cases.

“An accelerated programme of recruitment should be examined now to put the DPC back on track.”