Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

We see so many good recommendations and reports and then there are delays in rolling them out.

I ask the Chairman to indicate when I have five minutes left because I want to ask a number of questions on the thalidomide issue. A very good report was done by the Comptroller and Auditor General in 2012 on the clinical indemnity scheme. The issues raised then are very much alive today. One of the issues was the savings recorded. I looked at the two reports provided by the State Claims Agency. The 2017 report recorded even bigger savings than a previous report. Legal costs were reduced by 48% in 2017, while the figure for 2016 was 43%. However, the chapter of the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General notes that the agency recorded savings in a manner that was not in keeping with policy at the time. When a selection of cases where money was saved were examined, it was found that the money had not been paid out and the savings figure could not be relied on. Will Mr. Breen comment on that and the changes made since then?