Mr. John Tierney:

Deputy Timmins asked a number of questions, and I am sorry for doing it the other way round. I did not understand exactly the question on parliamentary questions. I provided an answer to that earlier. Whatever decisions the Government makes on the provision of information, as I clarified earlier in the meeting, Irish Water will obviously abide by those.

In relation to the board of directors, Irish Water, as an organisation, reports to two boards. Originally, it was the Bord Gáis board, but there was also a separate board set up last year for Irish Water as a subsidiary of Bord Gáis.

Deputy Timmins asked for certain information to be published on the website. I might take up separately exactly what he is looking for in that regard and we will examine that.

On the comment about the assets, I did not in any way convey an adjudication on the local authorities. I simply stated as a fact that, mainly because of resource issues and, second, because introducing an asset management system would be a new approach, we are where we are in terms of the provision of information on the assets.

On outstanding debtors, there is a process in place with the local authorities on the non-domestic debt which is being worked through because they will provide us with an agreed handover figure on 31 December but the bills for that period still have to go out. There is a period of the first six months of this year - is it nine months for six months-----