Mr. John McCarthy:

The four local authorities have provided both for the committee and elsewhere explanations of why the project has taken longer to complete, with a range of factors involved, some of which are outside the council's control and some of which relate to engagements from the European Commission arising from complaints that have been made and have now been determined. The value for money assessment will be carried out by the National Development Finance Agency. The four Dublin authorities have the statutory responsibility and have gone through a process to satisfy themselves that this is the appropriate way forward because there is no central Government funding here. This is an issue for the four Dublin authorities and their capacity to recover the expenditure that has already been incurred.