Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Ó Cualáin, although I would appreciate it if he would do what I asked him to do. I thank my colleague, Deputy Cullinane. Mr. Howard, in his contribution relating to 30 September, said the following: "There was a very busy agenda that day and at the end of this meeting this was raised verbally as an AOB item. There was no briefing given to us." This is the external auditor saying there was no briefing given. He is directly contradicting the witness. "I have reflected on how I will phrase this: neither I nor any of the other outside members of the committee took from that briefing any sense of the importance of this issue as it subsequently emerged. Ultimately, this issue was so serious that the accounting officer had to amend the statement of internal financial control. I do not believe that this happened before on a Garda Vote so, objectively speaking, this was a very serious issue. It was raised, we discussed it a bit and we were asked if we would include it in the 2006 work programme which was done." That is totally contrary to the evidence the witness is giving here.