Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Friday, 15 July 2016

Public Accounts Committee

HSE Financial Statement 2015

10:00 am

Mr. Tony O'Brien:

We do not have those kinds of powers. We cannot knock down doors and force entry. We can go in at any reasonable time and reason would suggest that we have to go in by appointment and arrangement. The internal audit report goes through that process but we do not have the type of power that the Garda Bureau of Fraud Investigation has or any power of that type whatsoever. We can only use civil powers. If we were faced with a refusal, obviously we could stop the money, provided we had good grounds to do so, or we could seek a court order forcing them to give us information, but we cannot raid people. I do not think the public would be pleased to see us going around raiding-----

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