Colm Brophy (Dublin South West, Fine Gael)
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I just wish to take an extra second or two to apologise to the witnesses in a personal capacity, and I am sure on behalf of much of the committee, for the delay and the wait. We appreciate the fact that they were waiting for an awfully long time. We had a private session which ran for longer.

I thank Dr. Collins for his excellent presentation. I would like to follow up on one or two things. The first area I would like to tease out is how what he is proposing and has sketched in outline fits in with the experience in other jurisdictions. Are there particular organisations in other jurisdictions with comparable remits which he would cite as fitting his outline neatly or as having best practice?

Dr. Collins has touched initially on some of the functions and areas which he would envisage moving to this body. It does seem to me that a very large body is being proposed with the secretariat, support services and structure mentioned. Obviously if one puts something on the scale and size which Dr. Collins has proposed into the mix, there will be a distortion in terms of the existing regulators and groups operating within the areas. Has he had any thoughts as to how he envisages the new forum fitting in with the current structures, particularly river basin management, the Office of Public Works and such things?