Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The joint committee has received a total of 49 petitions to date since the launch of the petitions system. This shows the level of interest within general society in the issue of oversight of what is happening in society in general and, more specifically, the delivery of public services. We are trying our best to get through them with fewer resources than we would like. We are going through each petition to determine, first, whether it is admissible. Where admissibility is achieved, we are doing our best to resolve the issue. The secretariat is doing great work in that regard.

The first petition I would like to bring to the attention of the committee is petition No. P00033/12 from Mr. Cearbhaill Ó Dálaigh regarding the transparency of the Central Bank. Mr. Ó Dálaigh is seeking legislation to extend the powers of the Ombudsman and under the Freedom of Information Acts to include the Central Bank. He also wants the committee to examine a co-operation agreement between the National Consumer Agency and the Central Bank to see if it is in the public interest.

At the meeting of 17 October 2012 the committee agreed to refer the issue of the extension of the Freedom of Information Act to the Central Bank and the Joint Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform. This committee sought pre-legislative consultation of the Freedom of Information (Amendment) Bill and a report to the committee. The committee further agreed to examine the issue of extending the Ombudsman's jurisdiction to the Central Bank in the context of the review of the Ombudsman (Amendment) Act. I will call on the petitioners to examine the petition briefly and then we will discuss the petition in depth.