Ms Sarah Keane:

The next question was related to the former president resuming his international duties and what that would mean. That is a matter for the International Olympic Committee. Mr. Hickey cannot resume his duties because he is not a director of the Olympic Council of Ireland and will not be. However, if he is reinstated - I am not sure if "reinstated" is the correct word - as an International Olympic Committee member, under the charter, he will have a right to be an ex officiomember of the Olympic Council of Ireland board. My understanding is the ethics commission of the International Olympic Committee will be examining this matter in detail. It has already received from us a copy of the Moran report. My understanding is a spokesperson for the ethics commission has indicated that there are other issues aside from whether a person has been criminally convicted at which it must look in relation to a person remaining in a role or as a member of the organisation. That is also my view. This issue will be discussed by the board.

I am, again, not pre-empting anything because it is very important that the board agree things. However, I suspect, based on soundings I have taken of board members, that the current OCI board would have significant difficulty with the former president being involved again.

The next question was in respect of the effect of the controversy on the OCI. It has been extremely damaging and very costly. At a time when, as Mr. Mulvey made clear, funding for Irish sport is not where we would like it to be, it is sickening for everyone that a significant amount of money is being spent in this way. However, this crisis has brought an opportunity for fundamental change and Irish Olympic sport will really see the benefit of that in the coming years. All sponsorship contracts of the OCI end this year or have already ended. We have no Sport Ireland funding at this stage but will continue to work closely with Sport Ireland and the Department and share all information required in terms of progress. I am, therefore, very hopeful that we will be funded in due course. I understand why there have been questions regarding public money being put into the OCI. I understand and accept that we must be responsible to the taxpayer and be able to justify funding. The board has no issue with that and understands it completely. We will seek to have our funding reinstated in a way with which everyone is comfortable. We continue to be funded by the IOC. It works on a four-year cycle. From that perspective, it has been very helpful because we know what funding we are getting from it until 2020. We also receive additional Olympic solidarity funding, which is more specific to programmes, from the IOC. We do not currently know what the full extent of that funding will be but will know within the next year. In that regard, there are some funds coming into our coffers.

In terms of flying business class or economy, who should be flying business class? The athletes should be because many of them are too big to sit in economy in comfort. If the Olympics are far away, which the forthcoming Winter and Summer Olympics will be, athletes currently have to arrive days in advance in order to allow extra time for their bodies to recover from sitting in a cramped space for a long period and they have to build that into their preparation. The athletes should be flying business class but the OCI needs money and support to facilitate that, which is vitally important. We are very open to funding being specifically allocated to athletes travelling in business class. We would welcome that and ring-fence it to ensure that athletes get what they need in that regard. The board would be very open to that and would ensure that the money would go where it should. If we are going to be athlete centred, it is not really about everybody else sitting in the back of the plane, it is about the correct people sitting in business class.

There was a question regarding the code of conduct. In terms of other countries' handling of their ticket allocations, it is a good question but I do not have much information in that regard. We have started asking those questions because we have met with some other European------