Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 3 December 2019

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach

Matters relating to the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform: Discussion

Mr. Robert Watt:

I do not know the individual details of that so I do not want to comment. When it comes to taxpayers' money and contracts, the details must be in the public domain. The details of the contracts with which we deal are out there. The contractors who engage with us know the rules of the game. They know that the terms and conditions, the price and so on will be publicly available. Let us come back on that because I do not know the exact details of that contract. There might be particular issues but I do not know so let us come back on that. We operate a system where the level of transparency is equal to any other country in the world in terms of freedom of information, publication of reports and making information available. A total of 50,000 parliamentary questions were asked last year and there were thousands of freedom of information requests. There is very little exempted that people cannot access in terms of what is happening in Departments. I will check the details of the example cited by the Senator and get back to her because that would be unusual.

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