Mr. Frank Daly:

I will be brief. As the Deputy inferred, we have been over this ground at considerable length in earlier sessions. I am of the view that we have been extremely accountable to this committee and any other before which we have appeared. There are few organisations - perhaps the HSE is an exception - which appear as frequently as we do before committees of the Houses. I could go into all of the oversight relating to the Comptroller and Auditor General, etc., but I will no do so because it is there for the record.

I understand that we will be subject to freedom of information requirements when the new legislation is passed. We have never objected to being accountable to this committee or anybody else. In fact, our annual report contains a plethora of information about the organisation. The one area where we have sensitivities is that which relates to commercial information. This goes to the heart of what we are, namely, a State body which is working on behalf of taxpayers but which is operating in the commercial arena. We need to do the best we possibly can and very often the debate regarding freedom of information and lack of transparency seems to return to matters relating to loans and debtors. We are asked, for example, what we paid for loans, their value, who were the debtors involved and to whom we sold the loans and at what price. In the past I have pointed out that there is a need for a reality check in respect of a commercial organisation operating in the commercial arena. We cannot put our cards on the table and indicate what we paid for individual loans or assets we are trying to sell. If we did so, we would be telling people about our pricing. I do not want to go on about this matter because we have been through it all before.