Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Returning to the issue of Wexford VEC, now Wexford ETB, given the sheer scale of the wastage of €420,500 of taxpayers' money, I would hope that something immediate could be done on this. That level of drain of funding every year over that eight-year period in total defies logic to the ordinary persons up and down the country looking in who fund-raise for their schools, parents councils and boards of management. Suddenly, they see this drain of funding. It cannot be allowed to continue.

The Department needs to conduct due diligence of that area. Obviously, there is great work being done by VECs as well. Side by side with that, this is a management issue which is a wastage of taxpayers' money about which I would feel strongly. It should never have happened in the first place. I am sure the Secretary General would agree that there is a need for controls. Given that he cannot find the documentation on it, I would ask him to review the internal controls that operate within that sector and the linkages to the Department to ensure that it never happens again. Can I take it that he would have concerns about the type of controls that were in place at the time this contract was entered into?