Mr. Ciarán Ó hÓbáin:

I can confirm that it is a shareholder. As I indicated to the Chair, we will provide this in the form of a diagram. It may be helpful for the Deputy to have this in front of him to engage about it. The Deputy referred to a meeting. The note on the meeting last year is in the public domain and the process has been dealt with. I do not propose to comment further.

The capacity of the bidder has been clearly established through the evaluation process, right through to procurement. To get through the gates of this procurement process, there were detailed criteria. Five parties applied to come through the gates of the process and three were qualified. For those three parties to remain in that process, if there were any changes within their bid, they had to revisit and go through the pre-qualification test again. Where there have been changes in bids in this process, they have gone through that process, it has been evaluated in accordance with the rules of procurement, and they were approved. Most importantly, the final tender received went through an extensive, rigorous evaluation. The first conclusion from that, which allowed for the decision that the Government took earlier this month, was that the bid had been evaluated as meeting all of the requirements of that procurement. There was a bigger decision to be taken about moving ahead with the project, the cost etc. By coming through that evaluation, it is a categoric assertion that this entity which is sitting before us today, and that is the preferred bidder in the national broadband plan procurement process, has met all of the requirements of the procurement process at PQQ stage and at final tender stage.

The Deputy referred to two companies. It is important that, at the PQQ stage where the financial resources of the McCourt Global company referenced and Tetrad were assessed by the Department's team and our advisers. The conclusion was that either company would have passed the test if it was the sole party, to allow the bid to proceed through the PQQ. At the final tender, while they both provided letters of support, Tetrad provided the commitment to the €175 million of equity. It is Granahan McCourt, not McCourt Global, that will provide the working capital. That is information which the Minister has been very clear on in responding to parliamentary questions in the House this week. I understand that the Taoiseach also referred to it.