Ms Emily O'Reilly:

Regarding the health repayment scheme and the jurisdiction issue, I suspect the Department, in rejecting my investigation recommendations, was taking a belt and braces approach to it. In any argument that it could put out in that respect, it was taking that approach. Regarding the question of the remit, it was raising an issue that had been dealt with fairly comprehensively almost 30 years ago when the Ombudsman's office was set up. I will ask my colleague, Fintan Butler, who has the detail on that, to comment further on that.