John McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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Correspondence dated 31 March 2015, from Mr. John Corcoran, is in regard to waste of public money in property transactions by the Office of Public Works, OPW. This is to be noted and forwarded to the OPW for a response on the matters raised. This matter was raised through an advertisement in a magazine, which set out several issues and concerns. We will note it but there is no harm in publishing it because it is already well published. We are asking for a comprehensive response from the OPW.

Item 3B.6 is correspondence, from Mr. Joe O’Brien, managing director, Medilink, regarding payment to the Order of Malta. This is to be noted and published and forwarded to Horse Racing Ireland, HRI, for a note on the procurement issue arising.

Item 3B.7 is correspondence, dated 25 May 2015, from Mr. Seán Ó Foghlú, Secretary General, Department of Education and Skills regarding an update on issues in Cork Institute of Technology, CIT. These issues were brought to our attention by a whistleblower and the response from the Department is set out there. The issues raised by the whistleblower, and the response, need to be dealt with in detail with the Higher Education Authority, HEA, and Mr. Ó Foghlú when they come in. One of the concerns I have is that the figures originally quoted, for example, in terms of the due diligence were somewhere in the region of €200,000 and later it was disclosed that in fact it was far more than that. Some of the figures put before us do not match from one piece of correspondence to another. The matter needs to be clarified. We will have to deal with this in far more detail. While we have the correspondence, I do not accept the response to some of the points addressed. We will deal with it when Mr. Ó Foghlú and the HEA come before us.

Item 3C is documents relating to today’s meeting, which are the opening statements, 3C.1 and 3C.2, all to be noted and published.

Item 4 is reports and statements received since our meeting on 14 May. There are three noted there. On 4.3, the Institute of Technology Blanchardstown, attention is drawn to the fact that the required review by the institute of the effectiveness of the system of internal control for 2013 was carried out in June 2014, some ten months after the year end. These accounts are to be noted.

The work programme-----