Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 13 June 2013

Public Accounts Committee

Statement by Chairman

11:50 am

Photo of John McGuinnessJohn McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I cannot answer differently. Let us bring it to the end of the correspondence because it may help in understanding what went on. They went into this overdrive of correspondence. Apparently, that is what civil servants do. They check things out and go from HEOs to APs up along the line. That is fine. I only discovered that at the end of August and therefore I cannot say how they felt about me. Maybe on a human level I can understand that they might have said that the Minister asked them to do something. I only consider myself as John McGuinness; I do not attach any other extras to me either as a Chairman or as a Minister, but they might have done so. They were trying to be specific and, I would suggest, helpful.

I wrote an e-mail to the official at the end of all of these e-mails. I am referring to the correspondence with the official that triggered this and which I am being quoted from. Perhaps it was a bad day when it was written. I had not met the official in question. That was my first time in the Department. I met him later on. Deputy Nash asked about the Civil Service. If I had met him beforehand and known him better, I probably would not have written the e-mail. He was a gentleman and a man that was well informed about all that stuff.

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