Mr. Tom Costello:

The Deputy is correct. There is an obligation on our board and we accept that. There are people like me on the board. I worked in the construction industry and was managing director of Sisk Group for 13 years. The strength I bring to the board is the understanding of how one delivers major complex projects. I was involved in many of the multinational investments here with companies such as Johnson & Johnson and I was closely involved with the Aviva Stadium, Croke Park and so forth. As Tracey Conway said, it is bringing an understanding of the design and construction of it and how one manages it in the private sector in terms of controlling costs and so forth.

I am supported by a board which has all the expertise involved in planning, project management, legal, procurement, engineering and architecture. The board is competency based in terms of the type of people who are put together on a team. Certainly, in the year I have been on the board, our immediate focus before we got involved in any substantial costs, and the main cost is the appointment of a design team, was that we do a due diligence on all the decision making surrounding the suitability of the St. James's site. I support what John said. Even in terms of the size of the site, for example, we went to so far as to carry out site investigations on the site to ensure there was nothing in respect of contamination, archaeology or rock. We have confidence about that and that has been proven, now that we have our design team on board, in the feedback it is giving us. The team is telling us there are no surprises. That is as I expected, because we spent a year just conducting due diligence on it.

The board and the executive are approaching it in a very professional way. For me and the board it is our project. There is a real sense of ownership.