Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Great. I saw that a new chief officer was appointed to the board in recent weeks. It was not a chief executive officer but a chief officer. We would like to get all the costs that are out there and that have not been made clear to us to date.

We will move onto category A documents, briefing documents and opening statements for today's meeting. Correspondence No. 2390 A, dated 20 September 2019, No. 2392 A, dated 24 September 2019, and No. 2408 A from the Data Protection Commission are briefing documents and opening statements for today’s meeting. We will note and publish these. Perhaps this is as good a time as any to take two items of correspondence relating to today's meeting from the Data Protection Commission. They are correspondence No. 2403 B and No. 2404 B. We have been in contact with the commission about getting the report. No. 2403 B makes it clear that the commission was concerned about the fact it could not issue the report without the consent of the Department. It sent the report to the Department and it had implications for it because the Department resisted. The letter is from Mr. John O'Dwyer, deputy commissioner, Data Protection Commission, who said the Department had already written to the commission to object formally to the publication by the commission of a short summary containing details of the eight findings made in the report, and the steps the commissioner called on the Department to take on foot of those findings. The Department had asserted that publication of this material without its prior agreement was prejudicial to its interests and, as a matter of law, was not within the commission's power. The letter from John O'Dwyer said they believed the report should be published by the Department. On 23 September, we received a further letter from Mr. O'Dwyer confirming the report had been published by the Department. We will note and publish these items.

Correspondence category B is from Accounting Officers and Ministers in follow-up to previous meetings of the Committee of Public Accounts. The first is from Mr. John Madigan, head of marketing and research, Strategic Banking Corporation of Ireland, dated 31 July 2019, providing information requested by the committee regarding the number of jobs supported by the SBCI in Ireland. We will note and publish this