Willie Penrose (Longford-Westmeath, Labour)
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I raised this issue with the Minister by way of parliamentary question. While I believe it was referred on the same day as Deputy Calleary raised his, the replies did not tally by any stretch. Moreover, I was aware that they did not tally and was surprised by the reply. I am familiar with the way parliamentary questions work and it was to the effect that nothing would happen until nearly September and the matter was under consideration. However, the hen had flown the nest at that stage and consequently, I was not informed correctly as to what was happening. I was somewhat disappointed by that because as the Minister is aware, I have a significant interest in the horse racing industry, probably as great as anyone present, and I spent a lot of time dealing with that Bill. I have a view of how this all happened but I will not express it in public. When the contract was put in place in 2001, it was for seven years. The guidelines have been in operation since 1999, although they have been upgraded and refurbished since then with the end-of-years service. However, when the seven-year period was up, the position at least was advertised and that was allowed for by the guidelines. In 2014, did the chairman write to the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine seeking an extension of three years? When it was announced, from where did the five years come?

My view is the Minister apparently gave a consent based on a business plan. Who prepared this famous business plan? Was it the case that the board never saw this business plan prior to the Minister giving his consent? After the Minister gave his consent, it was necessary for the decision to go back to the board. However, as the Minister is giving €60 million on behalf of the taxpayers, would the board not appear very ungrateful if its members started to kick up a row in that context? The cart was in place before the horse in this regard. The first hop of the ball is the board should have discussed the business plan in its totality and then made its pitch.

The Minister then would have been obliged to note that this was a third application and that at a minimum, it would be necessary to advertise or do something in this regard. Everyone is saying no one else could do the job and the outgoing chief executive officer undoubtedly had tremendous expertise and so on. However, nobody would let anybody go if that was the case, because I am sure all chief executive officers have many attributes and much acumen acquired over the years.

The development at the Curragh, with all this money brought in from outside, does not say much. A lot of it was brought in on foot of work by the Turf Club and it does not all reside in the great person who is involved. That would be to mislead everybody because many people were involved in that regard. While it is easy to develop the big courses, the same people used to irritate me when they nearly put the small ones out of business. Part of the problem I have with the whole lot of them is that this is still their view. It is always the three or four big courses about which many of those people are concerned, not the small ones for which members were obliged to fight hard here. Thereafter, even when the battle had been won, little wasps or stingers are still being sent across to the unfortunate small courses seeking more money. I will state straight out to the Minister what my problem is with Horse Racing Ireland, HRI. It has received €60 million or more over the years, yet it always came looking to the bloody unfortunate people who owned or had a few old horses in training or people like that. It was always looking for something like that and I have expressed my annoyance at that behaviour.

Perhaps I am a bit stupid - I probably am - but there is something I cannot understand. There was a board meeting today and as far as I am aware, some people still had not seen the business plan. Perhaps they saw it today or they may have seen a summary of it. This is what I think happened: the Minister gave his consent and appears to have advised the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform to give his consent. That is the sequence of events and the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform has stated it was necessary for the Minister to give an advice. The only way in which the Minister could have given an advice was based upon a board decision. The Minister could not do it unless there had been a board decision. In accordance with the Act the Minister has quoted, there must be a board decision and it cannot be just one person.

On a related topic, as the Minister has only been in office for three or four months I will give him a pardon but why has the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine refused to carry out a value-for-money audit on HRI? It was one of the recommendation of the Indecon report that I debated here until I got sick to the teeth of it. As that was two years ago, why has that not been carried out? We are paying €59 million; let us see such an audit. This matter should also be addressed because that has not been carried out. A number of issues arise in this regard and I believe that whatever happened in 2011 had consequential knock-on effects for this appointment now.