Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 20 June 2019

Public Accounts Committee

Business of Committee

9:00 am

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The reply indicates that the late submission of its accounts for 2018 arose because the board had to accommodate the work schedule of the accountants it engaged. I am informed that the accounts will be submitted to the Comptroller and Auditor General's office this week, on 21 June..

I also received a reply from Mr. Mark Griffin, Secretary General of the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment, regarding financial statements for the environment fund. Departmental officials agreed last year that the accounts would be submitted on 30 June. Mr. Griffin indicates that arrangements have been put in place to ensure that timeline is met.

The reply from the Pre-Hospital Emergency Care Council thanks the committee for its letter and indicates that its accounts have since been submitted to the Comptroller and Auditor General's office. There may have been a slight misinterpretation of our letter in that the council took it to mean that we wished to see its accounts before they went to the Comptroller and Auditor General. To clarify, our letter was to request that they be submitted to Mr. McCarthy's office.

That last batch of letters came into my possession yesterday. I did not have time to circulate them before today's meeting but I wished to get them on the record. We have made great progress in ensuring that public bodies submit their financial statements for audit. It may be boring stuff, but it is important to keep the pressure on them. If they do not produce annual financial statements, they are not doing their work and we cannot do ours.

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