Professor Noel Whelan:

I might come back in. As Mr. Jermyn has said, the legal situation that faced us, as we were told, was that we were completely and utterly compliant with the section 38 legislative requirements.

We can cover that in the questions if members wish.

Moving onto the late disclosure of information, people were looking for the information coming up to about 20 December. At that stage the board was in perpetual session. We decided it was a major public interest issue and that we needed to review the public interest requirements. Nobody forced us and we unilaterally put aside the legal advice and said that we would release the information. Then, we called a board meeting on 22 December. We are a voluntary board and people have other things to do. People receive no pay so we cannot press a magic button and get a special board meeting. We called a special meeting and we said we would release the information. The board agreed and that brought us up to the Friday before Christmas. Then we released the information and it hit the public on 23 December. I admit it was near Christmas but we could have held off until the new year when it would come out in the fullness of time. We rushed to get it out and I know it irritated people.