Mr. Fergal Mulligan:

We got to know the National Development Finance Agency very well over three years because of its involvement. It was involved in 2016, 2017 and 2018.

They have not been involved since 2018 because the procurement process and the evaluation which they were involved in finished when the evaluation was finished in October or November 2018. They came on the pitch in discussions with myself and Mr. Ó hÓbáin's predecessor in 2015, when we discussed their role in the NBP process. That was four years ago. Clearly, they have a role, as the Deputy states, under the legislation of any projects costing over €20 million.

It was agreed at that time what their terms of reference would be for the NBP. We set out our stall about what the NBP process was. We had hired at that time KPMG to be our commercial finance advisers, as well as other advisers. We had PBC on cost-benefit analysis, CBA, Analysys Mason on technical and Mason Hayes on legal. It was the view of the NDFA - the agency was busy with roads and schools, etc. at the time - that there would be a duplication of resources for it to take on the entire corporate finance role within the process when KPMG had just been hired to do the same work, and a full team of KPMG people that the NDFA would use for roads and schools as well.

However, the NDFA was involved along the journey of the procurement process. A senior member of-----