Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

In line with the committee's focus today on the internal audit report in relation to aspects of financial management at the Garda College in Templemore, I do not propose to comment in relation to the Vote 20 appropriation account per se. The statement on internal financial control in the 2015 appropriation account for Vote 20 - An Garda Síochána, includes a disclosure that a number of features of the provision of ancillary services in the Garda College were not compliant with standard public governance procedures, and that an examination by An Garda Síochána's internal audit was ongoing.

The internal audit report finds that on a number of occasions over the past decade issues had arisen within An Garda Síochána about certain financial procedures at the college. These issues were not communicated to my office until 31 May 2016 when the head of the Garda's internal audit, Mr. Niall Kelly, notified us of the concerns. That was after the 2015 appropriation account had been submitted to me for audit, and while the audit was under way. Mr. Kelly informed us that he planned to undertake an internal audit of the college’s affairs, and that duly commenced on 22 June 2016. On 29 August 2016, internal audit informed us that an interim report had been drafted, and that significant issues had been identified that required further investigation. Because we did not have a report or the detail of the findings at that stage, we asked the Accounting Officer to amend the 2015 statement on internal financial control to disclose the non-compliance with corporate governance standards, and advised that an investigation was ongoing. I signed off on the audit on 5 September 2016.

A copy of the interim report executive summary was provided to my office on 13 September 2016. We were provided with the final report on the internal audit on 22 March 2017.

We are examining the information and concerns outlined in the internal audit report and will be examining relevant records as part of the audit of the 2016 appropriation account to identify the implications for Vote 20 and other Votes, if relevant. I plan to report my conclusions on the matter in September when I publish the 2016 report on the accounts of the public services.