Dr. Alan Wall:

In the context of the competition that was being run for capital expenditure we noted that a change of site was being made as part of the application. The change was from the opera site to the Dunnes Stores site. Under the legislation, it is a matter entirely for the university to make land purchases. It can undertake purchases and does not require oversight or any permission from the HEA to buy land. In the past ten years there have been dozens of land purchases by universities. We have not had sight of them and we do not generally have sight of them.

What happened here is that in the context of the competition we got a letter, which said that the board of governors had signed off on the purchase, that it was a good deal and that they thought it was a good deal. That was in the letter we had in that context.

We also had the annual governance statement from 2018 to 2019, which we require everyone to sign. In the statement we had a place where any financial risks or new financial information could be disclosed. The €8 million was disclosed there by the UL. We also asked about capital investments and whether the governance requirements were observed, and we have a statement saying that they were. The board signed off with no issues. There is a general question in the template asking whether there are any general governance issues that we need to be aware of.