Shane Ross (Dublin South, Independent)
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I thank Deputy McDonald for raising the issue. I do not know if we are being told it is outside our remit, which we are used to hearing about anything that is particularly awkward. The Central Bank has had a series of problems with whistleblowers, which the committee is familiar with. Some years ago, it suppressed information that Eugene McErlean brought to it. More recently, a whistleblower challenged the Central Bank's stress test system and suggested it was not all it appeared to be. In the case of Eugene McErlean, the Central Bank was subsequently found to be wrong. When Matthew Elderfield came before the committee we asked him questions about the second whistleblower. He was more than reluctant to answer any questions and left an unsatisfactory situation in which we never got to the bottom of why the whistleblower had found the Central Bank a very cold climate in which to blow the whistle. We never found out what happened to the whistleblower. It was unsatisfactory. Now we have another case. We cannot accept that it is outside our remit. Some civil servant will bury it and ensure we do not discuss it. There is a pattern that is worrying and we should pursue it with more vigour than we are being encouraged to.