Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Some of it. I am not trying to catch anyone out but my issue here is whether there was concern within the Department. I asked parliamentary questions on this, as did others, and the report came through in January. The Committee on Justice and Equality discussed this yesterday. An IT audit report will come before this committee in the future. I believe that this will require an external investigation on the scale of the projects, the tendering or lack thereof, the verbal sign-off on contracts, the volume of people on site in An Garda Síochána, and the manner in which those people were allowed access on site. I believe there are issues here on taxpayers' money, security, and tendering-procurement across the board. A report is coming through on that. As the overseeing Department, I want to know if the Department of Justice and Equality had any concern on this issue. The witnesses have clarified that. We will deal with that in due course and take on board what Ms McPhillips said.

I turn to other issues. On taxpayers' money, and I will not encroach on the tribunal, the Department made a decision to sign off verbally on funding for the Charleton tribunal and for the Charleton liaison committee. Is it normal that a Department would give verbal sanction without Department of Public Expenditure and Reform co-agreement? Is it normal for the Department of Justice and Equality to do something verbally and then proceed to give it in writing a substantial time later on something like that? Is that proper practice?