Ms Josephine Feehily:

The suggestion that there was not a strong two-way process implies we could have fixed it. There was a taxpayer confidentiality barrier to our giving him information about taxpayers. Similarly, there was a company law barrier on what he could do. We are both creatures of different bodies of law. The authorised officer had his body of law, which enabled him to do only a certain, narrow area of work and to send the report in certain directions. When it came to us, it had to come with the direction set by the relevant Minister. In our body of law we have a broader range of powers, but it includes absolute taxpayer confidentiality. In some ways, we are in silos regarding the case level information. I assure the authorised officer, if he needs assurance, that we followed through on and examined every piece of information he gave us, regardless of where it took us.