Clerk to the Committee:

I will respond to the final question first. Members will see on their screens a draft reply which has been perused by the Parliamentary Legal Adviser. The position is that documentation was sent to the committee, but given our sensitivity to the related issues of data protection and privilege, and the law that now states that we can refuse certain documentation, the committee agreed a number of weeks ago that we would immediately forward the documentation to the Parliamentary Legal Adviser for appropriate counsel to look at and identify the issues. We have not received that legal advice. We have scheduled the meeting with the Commissioner for 23 January, the second week after the Christmas recess. We will look at the Comptroller and Auditor General's report. As Deputy Deasy stated, no member of the Committee of Public Accounts or the secretariat has the documentation that was sent to the committee in their possession and the documents are with the Parliamentary Legal Adviser.