Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

No, it is not. The State, through a very stupid Government decision, privatised the company and created it through a licence structure that put in place a legal provision, in a law passed by the Oireachtas, which stated there was a proviso under which unclaimed prize funds can be spent. It also stipulated that some part of that money must go towards topping up prizes. That is not the case in any other area. I do not understand how anyone could conceive that it is not in the public interest to find out that only 2% of that money went to that purpose and 98% went towards advertising by the company, particularly when PLI will not give us the figure in terms of other advertising. For all we know, this could be PLI's entire advertising budget.