Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

The funding and a lot of the oversight of an institute of technology would have been through the Higher Education Authority, HEA. However, there would have been some relationship with the Department too. The Department obviously monitors financial statements and sees these kinds of problems developing. There have been a number of institutes of technology over the years, which have had deficit positions but again, working with the HEA some of those have been turned around. There are things like drops in student numbers, for reasons like courses not being as popular. Coming through the Covid period too there have been difficulties. From the information available, the unauthorised bank accounts were probably to collect money for field trips or various fundraisers that were run in specific departments. You do not want to see any bank accounts that are not within the financial statements and being fully accounted for. It is never really a satisfactory position. There is then a question of people voluntarily contributing money. Is it public money or is it private funds they are holding? It could be club money or whatever.

No. 56 is St. Patrick's College, Drumcondra. A number of years ago the teacher training college was amalgamated into Dublin City University, DCU. The assets and liabilities and so on of St. Patrick's College were, in the main, transferred into DCU. An amount of money, I think it was €1.3 million, was left in the St. Patrick's College account because of the possibility of historical claims against the college. It was felt appropriate to leave an amount of €1.3 million with St. Patrick's College. We have been auditing it for a number of years and accounts have been presented, but there are no transactions on it, and there have not been any claims. From a structural perspective, the board of the college has decided to transfer that fund into the charities funds of the archdiocese of Dublin, with an expectation that if no claims occur in the future, the moneys will be transferred back to DCU.