Mr. Robert Watt:

Absolutely. I am very happy to make a few comments, although I do not have a written statement. This matter has been ventilated previously at committee meetings. I submitted a report on 12 April last year to An Taoiseach. This report sets out the position. As people are aware, a further report on the matter was commissioned and was published this week.

I do not have much to say by way of introduction because I think Deputies and Senators know the issues. Tony Holohan, Martin Fraser and I entered into this matter in good faith to propose something we thought was clearly in the public interest, that is, to enhance public research across the university sector and for Tony Holohan to take up a secondment in Trinity College to facilitate that. We were motivated by the public interest. I said to committees previously and I said in statements that there were issues around communication that we should have handled better in terms of how this was communicated. In March of last year, we were bounced into issuing a statement before all the details of this matter had been finalised. That led to some confusion and commentary. I am very happy to answer questions from Deputies and Senators in relation to this matter.