Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)

I am not sure about the language used in that, if I am being honest and fair as regards the shock element. I think there was an awareness in relation to the scale of this project. My real issue here is about the escalation procedure. In fairness to Mr. Ó Coigligh, in his statement he has apologised, I have to acknowledge that, and he has apologised in a pretty comprehensive way. I have previously worked in IT in a semi-State organisation, when codes were slightly different I will admit as it was a long time ago. I have gone through all these correspondences and tried to fill in the blanks but the nub of the question here today is whether Mr. Ó Coigligh can explain how this was not escalated up in his Department. I am not saying it is Mr. Ó Coigligh, but as the Accounting Officer for the Department now can he say why this was not escalated up? I will not get into all the other reports, including that from Professor Niamh Brennan. I am absolutely certain that smaller organisations that report into any other Department or Mr. Ó Coigligh's Department need help when it comes to IT projects, there is massive corporate letting across the whole State in relation to that, and we cannot repeat the same level of IT departments in all of these organisations as that would be impractical. However, how can Mr. Ó Coigligh explain that the issue did not get escalated given all the correspondence we have seen?