Mr. Robert Watt:

What went wrong in this project is pretty clear from the discussions that have taken place in other Oireachtas committees and the public debate about this. We adopted a two-stage process which involved significant preliminary expenditure, spending €200 million on preliminary works. There was a commitment to finalise the design and move to phase 2 of the project. There was a view at the time of the signing of phase 1 of the contract that there was certainty about the approximate bill of quantities. That did not turn out to be the case. The estimates of how certain we were about the bill of quantities were not correct. The bill of quantities increased very significantly compared with what was included in the project. The reasons for the cost increase from the Government decision in spring 2017 to where we are now are set out very clearly. Most of the increase relates to remeasurement of the bill of quantities. There was some design scope creep. Some value engineering savings were not delivered and other matters played a part. The Mazars report and other discussions have very clearly set out the reasons for the increase in prospective costs. We are working through what that means for future procurement. That is what I have been trying to outline today. One lesson is not to commit to projects until we have absolute certainty about costs and to ensure that we have detailed designs which form the basis for any cost.