Mr. Donal McNally:

My main area was the economic side. I don't know about the other side but the financial side, there would have been also IT skills but I do admit there was a problem in terms of resourcing on the economic side. I found this out early on when the economic forecaster, who I think was Robert Watt, who is now the Secretary General of PER, I think he was the short-term economic forecaster. I was seeking somebody to replace him and I had some difficulty because there was a reluctance to go on to the economic side, because people thought that their career prospects were better if they had a more broader experience and they weren't identified as being too technical or working too long in one particular area. I said to the person that "look you will only be there for a couple of years, you will be replaced" as a way of trying to get him to agree. As a result of that, I spoke to the Secretary General, John Hurley, who became Governor of the Central Bank, and he arranged for the Central Bank to second an economist, John McCarthy, who has since gone on to be the chief economist. That was sort of a stop-gap measure to an extent.

When Derek Moran, the current Secretary General, came in, he conducted an analysis of the leads of the section and proposed a plan to recruit economists directly, which was done, and to bring in some other people from other parts of the Department, from the NDP - the national development plan side - who were, that was running down their engagement there. We also took on another economist in 2006 from the Central Bank. So something, things were done. I don't think there was any lack of quality, it was more an issue of quantity. The Wright report did say that the analysis presented by the economic side was as good as any else and there were no complaints that I heard from any of the international bodies they dealt with to that extent. While they might have had a small economic side, it did work with the ESRI and the Central Bank and the Commission so to an extent they were able to use their resources as well in their activities and the Commission would have had regular meetings to discuss the economic methodology and the economic forecast.