Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour) | Oireachtas source

My colleague, Deputy Harris, touched on the issue of tribunal costs earlier. Obviously, everybody is concerned about the expenditure of public moneys. We have all expressed eagerness to provide for value for money and a level of control over legal costs.

In response to that, the State Claims Agency, SCA, established a legal costs unit, which kept an eye out in terms of intervening in what might be regarded as excessive legal costs - for example, around the planning tribunal. Will the Secretary General talk me through how the Department interacts with the legal costs unit of the State Claims Agency in terms of managing those costs? The view was that those costs had got out of control and clearly the legal costs unit has tried to deal with that. Will he talk us through how the Department deals with the unit and its role in bringing costs down?