Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Yes, it is important. My experience of submitting freedom of information requests to the Department of Social Protection on various decisions is that there are different freedom of information officers or units in the Department depending on which allowance is involved.

We need to know who in the freedom of information section dealt with these requests and if there is one office with overall responsibility for freedom of information requests. The committee secretariat will send that letter today and we will review the situation tomorrow morning.

The next item on the agenda is correspondence. Category A correspondence is No. 357A - a briefing document from Mr. Diarmuid Collins, chief finance officer, University College Cork, in advance of tomorrow’s meeting, to be noted and published; No. 359A - a briefing document from Ms Anne Campbell, president of Dundalk Institute of Technology in advance of tomorrow’s meeting, to be noted and published; No. 360A - a briefing document dated 24 March from Mr. Neil McDermott of the Higher Education Authority in advance of today’s meeting, to be noted and published and, No. 368A - a briefing document dated 24 March from Ms Callista Bennis of University of Limerick in advance of tomorrow’ s meeting, to be noted and published.

Category B correspondence is correspondence from Accounting Officers and-or Ministers, and follow-ups to previous meetings.No.s 355B (i) and (ii) is correspondence dated 23 March from Mr. Aidan O'Driscoll, Secretary General, Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine. This is a follow-up to his appearance before the committee on 20 February and a subsequent information request. This correspondence will be noted and published but I propose to come back to it again. Mr. O'Driscoll gave us information in regard to the account from the European Union from which grants to farmers are paid. As this is a €1.5 billion account, which most of us will not have seen before, I suggest that members take a few days to review it following which we can seek some points of clarification.

No. 356B is from Mr. John McCarthy, Secretary General at the Department of Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government providing follow-up information subsequent to his appearance before the committee on 2 March 2017. This is an extensive document, comprised of 26 pages. This correspondence will be noted and held over for future discussion. Members may raise any issues arising next week. If any particular question has not been fully answered in this document we can come back to it. There is a lot of good, comprehensive information in the document and I encourage members to read it.

No. 358B is a letter dated 24 March from Mr. Stephen Mulvanny, chief financial officer and interim deputy director general at the HSE providing replies to questions raised by Deputy Aylward at our meeting with the HSE on 9 March in relation to possible misappropriation of funds and control breaches, to be noted and published. If Deputy Aylward has any further interest in the matter he can raise it again.

No. 371B (i) to (iii) is a letter dated 27 March from Mr. Joseph Nugent, chief administrative officer, providing a copy of any interim report on financial procedures in the Garda College, Templemore, to be noted and published. We will have to agree to set a date to invite in the Garda Commissioner to answer questions in relation to the very substantial document received by the committee in the last day or two. The report is the full internal audit report. The correspondence includes a document entitled "Progress Report: Interim Audit Report - Financial Procedures in the Garda College" dated 27 March. Also included is the original interim audit report - financial procedures into the Garda College, Templemore February 2017. It was mentioned yesterday in the Dáil by the Minister that this committee would examine this report. In any event, we will. We will be setting a date in that regard.