Shane Ross (Dublin Rathdown, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I will deal with Senator John O'Mahony's questions first and then proceed in chronological order.

The disappointment the Senator expressed about non-co-operation is felt by everybody. This time last year many expressed their willingness to co-operate, but they fell gradually one by one. The Senator is right that this leaves some questions unanswered.

I will answer the question about whether we should have gone ahead without five of the stakeholders. It was not a matter for us but for the judge. He could have said at any stage that they were pulling out one by one, that he did not think it would be worthwhile continuing and that he was not getting what he had expected, but he did not do that and was right. The Senator and I have read the report. The key institution in finding out what happened in the distribution of tickets and the governance of the OCI is the OCI and it would have been much more helpful to have the people with whom it was dealing. The judge discovered the email trail which was first-hand, independent documentary evidence, but he did not discover the money trail and did not get in some of those parties. He found the email trail and uncovered stuff about which nobody knew beforehand.

I am anticipating a question from Senator Frank Feighan. Did anybody mention this to me beforehand? The answer is "No, absolutely never".