Mairéad Farrell (Galway West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I add my frustration that we do not have Children’s Health Ireland or the board in front of the committee today. This committee is incredibly important because we look at how public money is spent. We always need to show respect to the taxpayers and how their money is spent. That is a critical part of the committee’s work. It is frustrating when this committee is trying to do the work we have been tasked with and are not able to continue and complete those tasks because we do not have the witnesses in front of us. While this might be the last meeting of this Committee of Public Accounts, I have no doubt the next public accounts committee, whoever may be the Chair and members, will continue that work and to make sure there is proper scrutiny of how public money is spent. I firmly believe the next public accounts committee, whoever is here – it might none of us or some of us - needs to be surefooted and strong in relation to having people come in front of this committee. The committee does important work. It is important that all those tasked with the responsibility of delivering public projects and spending public money are held to account and scrutinised. It is crucially important that they show this committee, the taxpayer and public the respect they deserve.

As a committee, we were incredibly frustrated by the difficulties in getting both the board and CHI in front of the committee. We now know from the Taoiseach's comments yesterday that the likelihood is the Dáil will be dissolved tomorrow and we will not have another committee meeting. That both of these witnesses had said they could come later in the month is not where this committee is at because we know the committee definitely will be dissolved by next week anyway. It is incredibly frustrating. It was good that we all worked together on this matter. We all spoke with the one voice from the same hymn sheet. Incredibly important work is done here. We need to make sure the public accounts committee, no matter who is on it, can continue the work that has been done up to now and that we continue to work together and make sure public bodies and whoever spends public money comes in front of this committee in order that we can do the work we have been tasked to do.

It has been agreed that the secretariat will write to the next committee and urge it to consider this particular item regarding the national children’s hospital. It will be an extremely important piece of work. We do not know when this hospital is due to be ready for action. God knows at this stage what the final price will be. Unless members have any further comments on this matter, that concludes our consideration.