Professor Declan McGonagle:

There is some information provided in the briefing document I have supplied. This matter has to do with sequencing. As discussed, these problems emerged in the records for the early 2000s and continued until 2008-09. In particular, the accounting issues were referred to in the terms of reference for the past five years. This is a period in which the matter could have been addressed. As our chairman attested, there was a raft of issues to do with strategic reviews on the college's agenda with which we had to deal. They had to do with fundamental issues such as validation, academic alliances and amalgamation. Cuts took place at the same time and there was a brief from the new board to create an enhanced academic profile for the college. All of these matters absorbed everybody's energy at the time. What we thought would help to address the issue, coming out of 2011 and heading into 2012, would be a move from discussions with UCD about an academic alliance to discussions about a merger. There was the identification in the memorandum of understanding on an academic alliance that back office synergy would extend to issues to do with procurement and audits. This did not include HR functions because of data protection issues but did include other back office functions. That did not happen, however, because we moved to discussions about a merger. Of course, in a merger all of these issues are contained within a larger institutional model. In terms of a merger, we ran out of time because the previous president of UCD had reached the end of his tenure. The new president waited until he had put in place his own strategic plan, which he did last autumn. That meant that we had lost between 12 and 18 months. When issues were raised in 2012 by the Comptroller and Auditor General, specifically these issues, we thought we would address them strategically as part of the process with UCD. Clearly, that methodology was inadequate. That is why the sequencing led to the current circumstances with which we are dealing.