Fianna Fail TD Mr Brendan Kenneally's announcement that the Office of Public Works is to decentralise to Dungarvan has not gone down well with his party and constituency colleague, Mr Martin Cullen.
Mr Cullen, who as Minister of State for Finance, has special responsibility for the OPW, says that decentralisation plans can be jeopardised by premature announcements.
Mr Kenneally, however, is unapologetic about his announcements that the OPW is to move to Dungarvan and that the remainder of the Land Registry is to be transferred to Waterford city, where some of its staff are already based.
Denying he was scoring political points, he told the Waterford radio station WLR he had always been involved in pursuing decentralisation for the constituency.
"I've always championed it. I'm passionate about it. I believe in it very, very much and I have been following this for so long that I don't see any difficulty in what I did in the past in telling the people of Waterford what was going to happen."
Mr Cullen, however, says that with negotiations with staff continuing, announcing decentralisation plans as finalised can only be damaging.
It was not, he stressed, a case of his being upset at a party colleague stealing his thunder. "It is simply not helpful for preemptive announcements to be made while negotiations are taking place."
Decentralising a large proportion of Government services was a complex matter, he pointed out, involving negotiations between the social partners as well as finding suitable premises in towns with the right infrastructure for the numbers to be transferred.
Contact number
Readers who wish to contact Chris Dooley can leave messages by dialling 01-6707711, extension 6298; e-mail address: cdooley@irish-times.ie