Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

It will hardly be squeezed in in the next fortnight before Christmas. I expect this motion will be debated in early January. If the Government tables amendments, while it is going in as a Committee of Public Accounts document, it is a broader issue once it gets to the Dáil Chamber. We will have done our bit by initiating the debate. That is as far as we can take it. The outcome of the debate is for the Dáil to decide, not the Committee of Public Accounts. At least we are getting the matter in there and aired. We will have no problems if different people have different views on it once we get it to the Dáil Chamber. I will present it as is. I might express a personal view or members might express personal views. Is it agreed to present the motion to the Dáil? Agreed. The clerk will send the motion to the Journal Office with a view to having it added to the Order Paper.

There are three categories of correspondence. The first is category A, briefing documents and opening statements for today's meeting. Nos. 1730A and 1732A are from the HSE, enclosing opening statements and briefing documents, which we will note and publish. Nos. 1735A and 1736A are from the Department of Health for today's meeting and we will note and publish them.

We have a large pile of correspondence which we have been holding over for quite a while due to the sheer volume of it. I want to run through some today. We will not clear it all but I hope that, next week, we will clear anything we have not cleared today. They will be on the screens if members have not brought hard copies.

The first is No. 1482B. In our previous report we included the issue of prepayments and the risk associated with them arising from the lessons learned from the Dublin Institute of Technology which paid upfront for its library services and lost over €700,000. We asked the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform to look at that. It is now recommending that the Government accounting unit of the Department will work with the Office of Government Procurement to clarify the position on upfront payments for procured services as part of general procurement. The current rules did not prevent the current problem from happening but the Department will clarify the position for the future.

I know that the issue of upfront payments will come up again. We will note the correspondence and publish the response to it.

The next item is No. 1486 which is a brief note. The correspondence which we will note and publish is from the Department of Education and Skills and concerns the Thorn report on Kildare and Wicklow Education and Training Board. It was received during the summer. It is the intention of the Minister, once he has had an opportunity to consider the report fully, to arrange for its publication. While we have discussed the issue before, we have never noted it. It is an old letter.