Mr. Ciarán Breen:

If I could take the Senator through the sequence, he might find where my logic is coming from on this. What happened was we did acknowledge and admit liability in respect of the non-disclosure. That was in our defence. As a matter of record and as a matter of law, we admitted liability. That was wrong and we said so.

The issue in the case was whether that failure to disclose affected Vicky Phelan's clinical outcome. There was a separate issue in the case whereby the US laboratory, during the short period before the case went to trial, had admitted liability, had offered the State an indemnity and would deal with her settlement. What happened in the particular case was the solicitors firm acting on behalf of the US laboratory had some difficulty getting instructions from its insurance company. We were, at all times, pushing towards making sure that Vicky Phelan got a settlement. That is always what we wanted to do.