Ms Josephine Feehily:

Yes. There is a conflict of interest. I have discussed that conflict both with the chair of the audit committee and with Mr. Nugent. Unfortunately, the legislation allows us to appoint only Mr. Nugent or Deputy Commissioner Twomey. Both, in my view, are equally conflicted. Deputy Commissioner Twomey is responsible, as the deputy commissioner in charge of policing, for spending all the money. The legislation provides that we must appoint one person, either the deputy commissioner or the chief administrative officer, and up to four others. We can appoint as many others as we like. We do not have a choice.

We had a very interesting discussion about this with the acting Garda Commissioner recently and with the chair of the audit committee. The chair of the audit committee is keen to have a uniformed policing presence on the audit committee to help its members understand the policing issues. We were asked if we could appoint an assistant commissioner but I had to say we cannot. The Act allows us to appoint only one person from An Garda Síochána, and that appointment must be at deputy level. I apologise but we have identified the issue and made it transparent to the committee, the acting Garda Commissioner and the person we appointed. We said it was not an ideal outcome and they all accepted it and therefore are all hopefully taking steps to mitigate the risk. The Act does not allow us to do what we would like to do.