Mr. Stephen Mulvany:

Reference was made in our 2014 accounts to the controls issues and it was a matter of emphasis in the Comptroller and Auditor General's certificate in those accounts. The HSE is fully compliant in respect of 2011 to 2013, inclusive. It is important to stress that we are not in any way seeking to minimise our tax issues. We fully accept it, we wish to be always compliant in tax affairs and we are working to do that. With the percentages, we are simply trying to reference the context of the scale of the HSE as the largest organisation in the State.

It is important to differentiate that this was the HSE operating under its own volition in 2012 to review its tax position, enter into a Revenue Commissioners co-operative compliance programme and make a voluntary, unprompted disclosure within that overall programme. There is no denying that the HSE had issues in achieving full compliance but we have tried to be up-front in saying that we still have those issues. However, there is a significant volume of work under way to address that, which we have also referenced.

There is a variety of different tax heads and we can certainly provide the detail. The payment comprises €18 million in tax and €4 million in interest and penalties. Of the €18 million paid in tax, €14 million amounts to payroll taxes; the bulk of that - we can provide the figure - is a delayed payment of employer's PRSI. That is not an additional payment but one which the HSE would have had to pay and has paid, albeit late, under this programme. The VAT payment is approximately €2.5 million over the three years. That is not an additional cost borne by the HSE but a cost that the HSE would have had to pay in overall terms. This is not to minimise the issue but the tax payment has, unfortunately, increased our deficit but has not been paid for out of direct service budgets.

Despite the challenges around our myriad systems, to which we will come, we are working to improve tax compliance. The level of awareness is significant and while we are obviously only concerned with dealing with our own tax issues, on which we are working, it is not true to state the Health Service Executive is the only public body that has made an underpayment of tax to Revenue. While I am simply trying to give this as the overall context, we take this very seriously and are working to improve it.