Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The whistleblower issue and the Comptroller and Auditor General's report are separate.

We will come to the work programme in a few minutes. We will hold that over until then but we do want to write back to make sure the people involved have been notified. The next item is No. 1775 B from Dr. Des Fitzgerald, President of the University of Limerick, UL, dated 4 December 2018, providing additional information requested by the committee in relation to the steps taken by the University of Limerick to engage with three specific members or former members of staff. It is a three page letter with one thing I want to confirm. In the second last paragraph of the letter on page 7, it is stated that persons B and C remain employees of UL. It continues by stating that UL continues to engage with persons B and C so as to ensure they can return to the workplace as soon as possible. I raised this the last day and I think we might have written back. If we have not, I want to know where in the workplace is being referred to. Is it a situation where the people involved are being offered some other job in some other section and not the job they were in before this incident? We need clarification. On reading that letter first, it might be thought that those people are back. If we delve deeper, they may not be back in their own job. I want that clarified.

The next item of correspondence is No. 1776 B from Mr. Ray Mitchell, assistant national director, HSE, dated 4 December 2018, providing further information requested by the committee regarding the transfer of the property on Grace Park Road from religious congregations to the HSE under the residential institutions redress schemes. We will note and publish this. We will keep a hold of it. It is still between the solicitors. We will not sign off on that religious congregation handing over the sites yet. This is an update on the letters that are toing and froing but without conclusion. We will continue to monitor that.

Correspondence No. 1778 B is from Mr. Seán Ó Foghlú, Secretary General, Department of Education and Skills, dated 3 December 2018, providing information requested by the committee. I refer to the instruction given to education and training boards, ETBs, in respect of the publication of minutes of ETB meetings, including the date of commencement and a schedule for each of the 16 ETBs for the publication of their minutes. I am pleased today that all ETBs are now publishing minutes of their meetings online. We will note and publish this. Helping to get that carried out is something we have achieved.