Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

Listening to the witnesses, I get the sense that the board is helpless. There is a serious logjam in this major project and I am not hearing any pathway towards the resolution of these significant issues. There is an element of people throwing their hands up in the air and shrugging their shoulders. What is the pathway? In answering, will the witnesses confirm what powers the board has under the contract to address the two major areas of contention, those being, the lack of a compliant programme – it is extraordinary that we have reached this point in the project and the board still does not have a compliant programme – and adequate resourcing of this contract? It seems that these two fundamental issues have been dragging on for years when they should have been addressed at an early stage. Why have they not been addressed and what deficiency is there in the contract that has made the board incapable of resolving them?