Ms Geraldine Larkin:

As regards how we use the additional funding, we will be guided by the direction in Indecon. Indecon identified the pension deficit. Equally, it would have identified the debt liabilities we have. Apart from those two core issues, the extra money will also be used to re-engage and reignite various maintenance programmes around the tracks. Up to now, the board has had to reduce expenditure so there is a heavy maintenance schedule to be undertaken. Within that, I would also like to see money going back to owners and welfare, which are core issues. The challenge for the IGB will be how to maximise that additional funding so that we can benefit as many different calls on the funding as possible and ultimately grow the industry as well.

Senator Ó Domhnaill queried how long the properties have been on the market. The Limerick properties have been on the market for some time. The Cork property has yet to go on the market and will be subject to planning, as is the case with Harold's Cross.

The Deputy also raised a number of questions about stanozolol and other anabolic steroids. The IGB sends a control sample of tests to the UK. That is all that is required for our accreditation. The IGB laboratory is accredited AA. It is accredited to both the Irish National Accreditation Board and the United Kingdom Accreditation Service, so we meet the laboratory standards of both. That being the case, the Deputy asked what happens if a positive is found. If a positive is found, the procedure up to now has been a hearing involving the owner, the control steward at the track and a representative from the IGB, following which the matter is referred to the control committee. In recent times, a review of the time taken to conduct the middle piece of that work, the hearing with the control steward, identified that it was causing a considerable delay. That stage is being removed so that cases will go before the control committee much faster.

The Deputy also asked if it was possible to publish positive results. Heretofore, we have not done this, because the results have been associated with the determination of the case. We are putting new protocols in place for this piece of work so that it will be very clear what we are going to do if we publish results. It will also involve removing the dog and the existence of a particular prohibited substance from the subsequent deliberation. There is a need for very clear rules to be implemented before we start on that process, so that everybody is quite clear about it. However, that work is under way with my colleague and we are determined that it will be put in place. In the interim, I would like us to be in a position to publish more statistics so that people have more of an idea what we are about and more confidence in us, so that one can see when cases go to a control committee how long they are at that control committee and so on.

The Deputy also queried the threshold for stanozolol and whether that has been varied or increased by the control committee and-----