Mr. Noel Waters:

I am the Accounting Officer for the Department of Justice and Equality. Everything follows on from that.

In a wider sense, if I go back a little bit, the Minister for Justice and Equality of the day is the person responsible person for delivering the resource allocation for the entire justice Vote. That includes the Garda Síochána, the Prison Service, the Courts Service, the Department itself and all the agencies of the Department. That is negotiated in the Estimates process. The Minister for Justice and Equality is responsible to Parliament. That is a key issue for the Department in supporting the Minister of the day in negotiating that budget for the Garda and all the other bodies.

The up-to-date position on oversight and accountability is that the Policing Authority was established at the beginning of last year, 1 January 2016. The Policing Authority is an independent body and its role is to provide oversight of the provision of policing services in Ireland by the Garda Síochána. It is independent of Government and reports to the Minister on its role. When the legislation to establish a Policing Authority was being considered, the Government and the Department sought legal advice on how far it could go in giving the accountability function for the Garda Síochána to the Policing Authority. It was deemed at that time that policing was a core function of the State and in those circumstances the Minister continued to remain accountable in the sense of political accountability for the Garda Síochána to Parliament. In respect of financial accountability, the Accounting Officer is clearly delineated to the Commissioner.