Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I hear what Mr. McCarthy is saying that ultimately the decision to work in this area lies with the Minister and the Department. I will not press him on that. One point I will make to him, though, is that often when there is media coverage of an event, there can be complexities to it that are not often covered in the media. As Mr. McCarthy said, for several of the incidents that were covered and that came out of this arising from the local government auditor's own reports, the complexities of those projects were not perhaps communicated in some of the media coverage.

It is important for local authority members but also in terms of informing the public and having public oversight similar to the Committee of Public Accounts, although I am not suggesting it would be that committee, to have that ability to be able to probe into the decisions and get away from the headlines and get more into the detail. That is a gap that exists. As I said, however, it is a policy matter so I will not press Mr. McCarthy on it.

The second question relates to housing generally. There is a very strong public sector house building programme contained in Housing for All that seems to be operating between local authorities and the Department. We have just completed a round of meetings with different local authorities in which we talked about that programme. From NOAC's perspective, what role does Mr. McCarthy see it having as that programme increases to try to ensure there is greater clarity about what approved housing bodies, AHB, and local authorities are doing and what commitments and targets are being met and delivered on?