Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Absolutely. More interestingly, they have gathered some data. There is a recent report of €3.791 billion spent, with €2.74 billion being tracked across 35,000 suppliers involving 3.8 million payment transactions from 64 public service bodies, for instance, in health. All of that sounds impressive, but one has to drill into all of this to see what it means. What we can know is that it is a partial analysis. The entire spend has not been captured.

Is there scope or a role for the Comptroller and Auditor General to analyse this area or how we go about doing what these witnesses sensibly suggest? I am certain that they speak for SMEs and microbusinesses everywhere. I know that because I have heard it everywhere that I have gone. They are credible in their position and their ask of us is reasonable. We need to figure out how we do it. Is there a role for the Comptroller and Auditor General to cast a fairly forensic eye across a piece of work such as this?