Mr. Gerry Kearney:

I will take the second question first and ask my colleague, Mr. Simon Taylor, to give more detail on subsidiaries. Both questions are interesting and valuable.

I chair a number of bodies outside the State sector but the National Concert Hall, NCH, is most demanding, in terms of time and board activism. On governance, a number of areas have been identified as needing attention and much of the board's work is conducted through its sub-committees on governance, finance and audit, programme spectrum and so on. There are five sub-committees and they are used to the governance donkey work.

On operation and management, the Senator is correct that the board does not directly intervene but it has influence as there is a diverse range of talent on the board. Micheál Ó Súilleabháin, from Luimneach, and various others are on the board and there is great talent there. The programme spectrum sub-committee considers the full spectrum of work and the balance offered by the hall between, for example, traditional classical music and Irish traditional music or modern music. There is active engagement through the sub-committees but we seek to build on the boundaries between the board and executive. A review was carried out by Brigid McManus this year on improving governance at the concert hall and one of our current tasks is the implementation of this review. I acknowledge the prescience of the Senator on this point. In answer to the basic question, it is an active and challenging board that takes up time.

On subsidiaries, the purpose is fund-raising and the model used by other national cultural institutions is having a separate subsidiary for this purpose. I will invite the CEO to say more on this point.