John Deasy (Waterford, Fine Gael)
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Like Deputy Nash, I will begin by thanking the institute for the effort it has made in the context of making full disclosure to the committee. Reference was made to chick lit and other issues. I need to balance such references with the fact that the institute is now ranked first among all the institutes of technology in Ireland in the context of attracting research funding. WIT does some very serious work and when I consider that with which we have been presented, I come to the conclusion that it does not contain a great deal of new information. Basically, it is a rehash of previous reports. I hope we will conclude our deliberations on this matter today because I am not sure whether they are doing anyone any good. This matter is the subject of a High Court case and I am of the view that it should be dealt with in that venue. It is very difficult for the current president of WIT to answer questions about this matter, particularly as he was not on the staff at the time. It is also very difficult for him to understand the mindset which obtained at the institute some years ago. He has been placed in a very difficult position and he cannot answer these questions. Dr. Neavyn has done a very good job in dealing comprehensively with this matter, particularly as he has no responsibility in respect of it. I hope that after today's deliberations the committee will move on.

In view of what I have just said, I wish to shift the focus away from the institute and direct a couple of questions to the Department and the HEA. How rigorous was the oversight function employed by the Department and the HEA 11 or 12 years ago? What is the nature of its current oversight function in respect of institutes of technology? What happened in the president's office during the period in question? Was the level of oversight which previously obtained sufficiently rigorous? Did people inform the Department or the HEA that guidelines were potentially being breached? It is not just the institute which had a function here in terms of oversight. The Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General, the Department and the HEA also had responsibility in this regard.

A former chairman, Mr. Redmond O'Donoghue, has stated that he was unaware of the excessive spend in the president's office. The controversy relating to this matter ignited in May 2011. Two years previously it was widely reported in local newspapers - the story even made the front page of the Waterford News and Star - that there might have been an overspend in respect of the president's new office, which cost almost €160,000. Did anyone in the Department or the HEA contact the then chairman, who stated that he was not aware of this overspend but about which everyone else in Waterford knew because it had been widely reported? Did anyone outside the college with an oversight function in respect of it raise any of these issues with the then chairman? Was he questioned as to whether he knew, or should have known, about what was widely publicised in local newspapers?