Annie Hoey (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am highlighting what I think the public perceives when the Minister says that line. It is certainly what people have said to me. I do not think the line is helpful for the Minister in this debate. The Labour Party position is that we hand over too many projects or State assets to voluntary bodies. We are moving forward in Ireland. I appreciate that everyone here is painstakingly explaining to us the different structures, layouts and set-ups but, ultimately, it still seems to boil down to, and this is a public perception, this not being a State-owned building on State-owned lands. This is the crux of the matter. People are unable to marry these two things together. I do not know that we will be able to come out of this committee having married those two things together because I think this is how the public feels and I do not know if a huge amount can be done about that.

I find it difficult to follow some of the companies, set-ups, people and complicated lease agreements. It is company after company and I feel like we are going to end up in the Cayman Islands. I am trying to follow these things. This is not in any way to suggest that anything is going to end up there. It is a complicated thing for members of the public to follow. Things that are making it difficult to follow include the fact that some pieces of the paper trail may be missing. Some of the stuff has been drip fed to us. It has been a bit of a sprint effort to go through the documents released last week. Two things are missing. We are bringing the Vatican back into this so forgive me but in respect of the agreement was sought between the Vatican and the Religious Sisters of Charity, whatever that agreement or paper trail was, we do not have sight of that. That is a cause for concern for the public because we do not know what was agreed. Maybe someone here has seen that but I have not seen it. People have not seen whatever the conditions of the agreement are. This land is extremely valuable. It is a valuable asset. It is hard for people to believe that the Vatican just went "there are absolutely no terms and conditions. You can just do whatever you like with it." If it has said that, it would be really helpful for members of the public to see that paper trail.

Another thing that is a sticking point in public understanding is the fact that what is in the table today is a slightly different agreement to what was touted in 2013. My understanding is that this change took place around 2017. It feels as though there was a change in how this would going to look. We went from public land and public ownership to this agreement. Has the Minister had sight of or examined the correspondence between the former Minister, Deputy Harris, and his senior officials around 2017 outlining how we got to the current agreement? Can this be made publicly available because this is something of a sticking point for a lot of people?

There is a question around the issue of indemnity in the share transfer agreement. I know a couple of legal experts, and I would welcome the Minister's own legal opinion on this, have said that some of these terms of indemnity are perhaps vague and could even cover the Religious Sisters of Charity holding company, RSC Caritas. Is it correct to say that the indemnity will extend as far as that? If so, is it appropriate for the State to give that indemnity to it?

What happens if the Religious Sisters of Charity ceases to exist? We have this layered system. What is the legal follow on if the Religious Sisters of Charity ceases to exist? Could the Minister elaborate on who owns what because these are the questions that have come into my inbox? Who would own what if the Religious Sisters of Charity was to cease to exist within the next 300 years, and we do not know what that will look like?