David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I had raised this first. I had asked that we write to the HSE to request a copy of the audit. I fully appreciate the request that we do not discuss someone in detail for the reason the Chair gave that it is subject to a Garda investigation and some of the individuals involved have a right to protection as well so I have no difficulty with that. The one thing I took from the audit itself and what was in the media reports, because a lot of this is in the media, was the attitude of the organisation as a corporate body to the audit. I found it to be quite shocking to be honest. Leaving aside all the issues which we will not go into, it was the response from the organisation to the audit that shocked me. We see lots of audits and reports where there is a finding or an opinion, whether it is a Comptroller and Auditor General report or an internal audit report and an organisation may not agree fully with the finding or the recommendations. There would be some commentary but it seemed to me that the attitude of the corporate body was "nothing to see here, hands off and how dare you even come in and ask questions". That seemed to me be the attitude so there are certainly issues for the PAC. We always look at process and whether the governance issues that should have been in place were robust and it seems they were not. We have been here before so this is not the first of the section 38 organisations that have been before us unfortunately.

If I remember correctly, when I raised this we had the HSE in some time ago where we discussed generally what improvements were being made and the relationship between the HSE and these organisations. The Comptroller and Auditor General was saying that improvements had been made on the back of our meetings and the work the HSE was doing and that the issues in this audit go back to a period a number of years ago where improvements have happened since. It might be unfair to us to say that there is still a huge problem but these issues still need to be ventilated some way. Maybe I will leave it at that and if we want to deal with it in private session or under our work programme we can but I certainly think we need to examine some of the issues. I am open to how we do that and I am deeply conscious of what the Chair said at the start as well.