Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 30 March 2017

Public Accounts Committee

Business of Committee

Mr. Seamus McCarthy (An tArd Reachtaire Cuntas agus Ciste)called and examined.

9:00 am

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We are joined by the Comptroller and Auditor General, Mr. Seamus McCarthy, as permanent witness to the committee and he is accompanied today by Mr. Shane Carton, director of audit.

There are just a few items of correspondence since our meeting of yesterday. In category A correspondence, we have correspondence items 374, 378 and 379, the opening statements from the University of Limerick, University College Cork and Dundalk Institute of Technology, in advance of today's meeting. Is it agreed to note and publish those? Agreed.

Category B is correspondence from Accounting Officers or Ministers and follow-up to meetings. Correspondence items 384 (i) to (iii) were received from the HSE yesterday as follow-up to our engagement with the director general last week. The letter also states that there was not time to respond to the further questions sent yesterday morning. Members may not have had time to read that letter, which arrived last night. In any event, as a result of yesterday's meeting, we sent three further requests for information and the HSE stated it did not have time yesterday. Given that we are still awaiting further responses, I believe that the best course of action now is to put the HSE officials on notice that they may be required to appear before the committee the week after next. We could decide a definite position on that at our meeting next Thursday when we receive the correspondence. We have received a response to what we requested last week. Yesterday morning we asked for three further pieces of information. Understandably, that has not been received yet. The HSE has indicated it will deal with it as soon as possible. I suggest we wait until we get that. In advance of receiving that we should now put its officials on notice to expect to appear the following week.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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That sounds reasonable.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We will ask the secretariat to liaise on the date. We will put them on advance notice, even at this point. That is as much as we can do this morning. We can note and publish the response received yesterday evening in any event.

In category C, correspondence item 380C received on 29 March 2017 from Waterford Intellectual Disability Association relates to matters raised during our meeting with the HSE last week. We can note and publish that. People may want to consider it. It relates to the case of Grace in the south-east region. People can take that into account for the next meeting. We will not be opening up new topics now. We will be very specific when they come in next time. We want to deal with it conclusively the next time they are here.

Correspondence item 380 is correspondence from Deputy Mary Lou MacDonald on matters relevant to our meeting with University of Limerick today. Is that noted? Does the Deputy want to comment?

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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It should be noted.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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It is on the record, so that is noted. It can be published.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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They will appear later.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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They are here at 2.30 and I believe the Deputy is the lead speaker.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Correct.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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The work programme is now on the screen. The only difference since yesterday is that on 22 June we have scheduled the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform to deal with its accounts and the Comptroller and Auditor General special report No. 95 on financial reporting in the public sector. We will need to arrange a separate meeting on the special report published earlier this week on the collection of motor taxation. I have not had time to review it yet.

Also on the work programme, we have always said we would come back to the section 38 and 39 issue and the 2015 financial statements of the HSE. That will all happen in May or June. We will call the HSE back to deal with its overall financial position. HSE officials have been here to deal with specific issues, such as Console and the Grace case.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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Yesterday, I requested that the Garda Commissioner and the Secretary General in the Department of Justice and Equality should appear before the committee to discuss the debacle of the money that may need to be repaid because of the inappropriate fines. We also have very serious issues with the Garda training college in Templemore. We do not know who the Commissioner might be by the time we get around to it. Irrespective of who it is, that person should appear before this committee along with the Accounting Officer for the Department. The Chairman said that another Accounting Officer should appear before the committee in respect of the training college.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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It is the Courts Service. It relates to the repayment of fines. Those fines would have been paid into the Courts Service and the repayments will need to start with it. It is part of the process.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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Is there agreement among the committee that we should do that in the first instance? Certainly with the training college some serious issues arise relating to governance and how accounts were managed. Does the Comptroller and Auditor General audit the Garda training college in the first instance?

Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

The Garda training college is a cost centre within the appropriation account of An Garda Síochána. Most of the expenses of the college are charges on the Garda Vote. Yes, I audit the college itself.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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Yesterday's report states that this first came into the public domain in 2008. I believe there was a further report in 2010. There were some changes, which were then reversed. At any point was the Comptroller and Auditor General aware of very serious issues? Did he ever address them in any of his reports?

Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

No.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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Was it that Mr. McCarthy was not made aware of it?

Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

No. The Deputy said that matters in the college became known publicly in 2008. They were not known publicly - that is my reading of the report - and we were not told about them. We were not aware of the work that was done in 2008. It was done within the finance-----

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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That is very serious. If that is the case, then there was an internal audit of which the Comptroller and Auditor General was not made aware.

Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

It actually was not an internal audit. It was an exercise that was undertaken, as I understand it, by the finance division of An Garda Síochána. Internal audit only became aware of it at some point. That is my reading of the report that was published yesterday.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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Okay.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Finally, one point I spotted in the report yesterday relates to the appropriation account for the Garda Síochána Vote. Is the latter separate from the vote for the Department of Justice and Equality?

Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

It is.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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The report states that the wording of the appropriation account in respect of internal controls for 2015 which has been signed off must now be amended to record the fact that there was not proper internal control in that. It is also stated that the new wording will have to be agreed with the Comptroller and Auditor General. What is the process for amending the appropriation account reports?

Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

The interim report was prepared before the audit certificate was issued last year. We were aware of this from last year. From 31 May last, we were aware that internal audit was about to go in and carry out an exercise there. In the circumstances and given what we knew about it at the time, we asked the Accounting Officer to put something into the SIFC-----

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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the statement of internal financial control.

Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

-----for last year's account. There is a reference in the statement on internal financial control referencing the fact that there is a problem in the college and that it was being investigated.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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So they got it done before.

Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

They got it done before-----

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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In advance.

Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

-----I signed off on it.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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Given that the Comptroller and Auditor General has now read the internal audit report and in light of the fact that it is obviously very serious that it indicates that assurances cannot be given that problem management and controls processes were in place, what does that mean for the Comptroller and Auditor General's work? Does it mean that will then form part of a more in-depth look at the training college?

Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

Yes. We are looking in detail at the issues in the context of the 2016 appropriation account audit for An Garda Síochána.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We have agreed that the Garda Síochána, the Department of Justice and Equality and the Courts Service have to deal with issues relating to fines, the courts, etc.. Obviously, they must also deal with the Templemore issue. This matter has been referred to us by the Garda Síochána and we have to deal with it. Separately, we have a meeting with the Department of Justice and Equality on its Vote and the issue of direct provision on Thursday, 11 May. When do members want to start scheduling the meeting we were talking about?

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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This was mentioned yesterday as well. I am not disagreeing with bringing in officials. My concern is that it is premature at this stage. We need to allow time for the full facts to be gleaned because we do not have them at this stage. There is no point in bringing in officials when we will not get the answers that we desire. We should wait a little longer. That is my view.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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There is a value in them, when they come in, knowing the extent of the fines, the amounts collected and the financial aspect of it.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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Exactly.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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They could not possibly know it just yet. They should have known but they do not.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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It will merely waste the committee's time.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We will give them at least a few weeks. We will hold the meeting in May or June. We will not set it for April. We must give everybody involved a few weeks to try to assemble the information, otherwise they would merely state at the meeting that they are working on it.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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Yes. Then we would have to go back and ask for more information. It would be a waste of everybody's time.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Okay. Is that agreed? We will schedule it but we have a number of meetings scheduled.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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That is reasonable because we do not want to be going through a futile exercise. At the same time, we should make clear that we want these officials to come, that they are expected here, the nature of the information that we require, and that we expect them to come in with the i's dotted and the t's crossed. We need to be reasonable but at the same time we cannot let this issue drift. I would just be worried that-----

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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I am certainly not suggesting that. Deputy Kelly was on the radio this morning asking for the Commissioner to come before the Committee of Public Accounts.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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That is right. They will have to appear here as well.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We will put them on notice. The secretariat will contact them formally and put them on notice, with a date to be agreed. That is it.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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That is it.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We will put it on the work schedule.

Those are all the items in respect of correspondence. We have just dealt with the work programme.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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On correspondence, we wrote to the Health Service Executive regarding Console. Has an answer come back?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We wrote to the Minister directly.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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Whoever we wrote to, it was to inquire about the non-payment.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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There has been no response.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I would not be happy with no response. This is a serious issue, particularly if staff are not getting their wages or salaries.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We will follow that up. Some staff in Console have not yet been paid for their work. We wrote to the liquidator as well. I can predict the answer we will get there.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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We should have a response. We asked for clarification of who got paid and who did not get paid.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We will follow that up. The Minister is the person to whom we wrote. I think we wrote to the HSE, the liquidator and the Minister. Really, the Minister will have to take some action on this.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Perhaps we need to write to them again. I agree with Deputy Connolly. For those concerned, this is a personal disaster.

Is the Chairman finished with correspondence? I wanted to raise a different issue.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Yes. We are now dealing with any other business.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Here is the item of business I wish to raise. I was more than taken aback yesterday evening to hear on the floor of the Dáil that the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, had threatened, through the Chairman, to injunct this committee. I would like the Chairman to give us an explanation as to when that happened and the context in which it happened. We should have been made aware of that fact. That is my first question. Second, if it is the case - I take the Chairman's word and I have no reason to disbelieve him - that such a threat was made against this committee we need to take that matter head-on. We need to correspond with the Minister for clarification as to his rationale. As the Chairman stated yesterday, the Minister clearly did not injunct us and it is not a case of withdrawing the threat. We, as Members of the Oireachtas, are elected on an equal basis, as is the Minister or anybody else, to come in here and do our job. I am of the view that we are due an apology for that deeply ill-judged threat made against us.

I also want to say this - I was a member of the previous committee and I am a member of this committee. That it is a matter of record. It was also alleged on the floor of the House by another member of Government that this committee had brought politics into disrepute in the previous Dáil. I want to make it absolutely clear, as somebody who was a member of the previous committee and who might be regarded as one of its disreputable members by those in government, that we did our work fairly and without fear or favour. Dare I say it, we did our work very well. We did it on a collegial basis. Far from bringing politics into disrepute, I would argue that we injected a level of optimism among the general public that some level of accountability in Irish political life was possible. I am referring to the Minister of State at the Department of Finance, Deputy Eoghan Murphy. I was taken aback because it is not his form to be aggressive in this manner. He was referring matters relating to Angela Kerins and Rehab. For the record, we won the court case relating to the latter. That might upset elements of the political establishment, including some here. We actually were vindicated in the courts. I wanted to make those points as well.

My question is as follows. Having dropped that bombshell last evening, the Chairman now needs to explain to us when it happened. Was it during that conversation to which the Chairman referred previously when the Minister, Deputy Noonan, had sought to speak to him that the threat was made? What are we going to do about it? I would not be happy to simply carry on regardless. There are those who would wish to spancel the work not only of this committee but also of the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General. A message needs to come from this committee that neither will happen.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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I was taken aback when the Chairman revealed in the Dáil last night what the Minister, Deputy Noonan, had said to him because the Chairman told us that he had a meeting with the Minister or that he had bumped into him in the canteen but he did not tell us what the Minister said. I am not trying to bring the Chairman's character into disrepute but I thought it was opportunistic to say it under the rule of privilege in the Dáil when it should have been said to us here and the Minister should have been afforded an opportunity to respond. Also, there is very much an assumption on this committee- with which I have difficulty - that the Minister approached the Chairman or that we seem to believe that the Minister approached the Chairman rather than it being the case that the Chairman approached him.

We do not know what happened and this scenario is all alleged. I am not saying the Chairman's words are untrue and conversely, I cannot say what the Minister has said is untrue. We have a difficulty and we must get to the bottom of it. It is incorrect, however, to assume the Minister for Finance's bona fides are incorrect and I was very disappointed by that stance.

My integrity, as a Fine Gael Deputy on this committee, is important. Therefore, I cannot stand over a report the words within which are not to my satisfaction. I am entitled to take such a stance. If I believe the rest of the committee is using political manoeuvres, then I am entitled to say so just as much as anyone else is entitled to say it about us. That is all I want to say.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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I call Deputy Connolly and she will be followed by Deputy Cullinane.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I shall start by discussing the last accusation of using political manoeuvres. That is outrageous. Throughout all of this process politics did not come into it.

I shall talk about the injunction in a minute and I might not be so gracious. I thank the Chairman for chairing these meetings fairly, under extreme difficulty and following serious attacks on a constant basis in the media and, in particular, leaks that I would say did not come from any of us present today. That raises questions in itself to the point where I said that we should not have private meetings any more. I suggested that we should have public meetings in order that we can determine the narrative. To state there was political manoeuvring is disgusting really - over a process politics never came into until the words "not advisable" cropped up. Simply, Fine Gael wanted to insert the words "not advisable". We changed our words to make the report as soft as possible to say not procedurally correct.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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Not procedurally appropriate.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Appropriate.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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The words were not acceptable to us, Deputy Connolly.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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Not procedurally-----

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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We are entitled to our opinion.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I have no difficulty with that but with the spin that it was political manoeuvring. I have no difficulty with Fine Gael having a vote. The spin that has been put on this matter has been truly shocking when the focus-----

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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It is the other way around.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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I ask members to please speak through the Chair.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I did not interrupt anyone. There has been non-stop spin by NAMA, in the first instance. There have serious public attacks made on an office and the attacks continued here. We bent over backwards to bring in everyone. I, for one, had an open mind and I believe everyone on the committee was the same.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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Yes.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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We bent over backwards to hear the evidence. To talk about political manoeuvring is really serious as it undermines the committee. As Deputy McDonald has said, the committee provides one piece of hope to the public.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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Yes.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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The one piece of hope is for us to come in here and try to ask questions, and sometimes ineffectually and not very well because it is extremely difficult notwithstanding the excellent help provided by the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General. Let us park this thing about politics because the claim has been made, on purpose, by Fine Gael.

I was taken totally by surprise by the Chairman's comment in the Dáil. In the first instance, he should have told us about it. Perhaps he can clarify why did not tell us. If he remembers the private session, I was the person who raised the comment in terms of the Chairman's conversation with the Minister and I said I was unhappy. I referred to a scenario in which pressure was being applied for us to change our words and asked what would happen if he spoke to each member of the committee in turn etc. I raised the matter with the Chairman at the time in private. Each of us are equal. It is a serious threat if that was the threat. It adds to the serious pressure put on this committee. I shall leave my comments at that and look forward to his clarification.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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I call Deputy Cullinane.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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Has the Chairman forgotten me? I mean no disrespect.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Deputy Cullinane is next as he indicated his wish to speak at the very beginning.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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All right. That is fine. Deputy Cullinane can go ahead.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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I thank the Deputy. It is important, in the first instance, that we do not allow issues like this to become a sideshow or act as a distraction because this very much mirrors what happened when NAMA first came before the Committee of Public Accounts to deal with the committee's examination of Project Eagle. At the time there were unprecedented attacks on the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General, on him personally and on his staff. We have dealt with all of that in our report. There was an attempt, on NAMA's part, to set a fire somewhere else and for it to be the narrative. There was an element of that yesterday when the Minister was in the Dáil. As the Chairman quite rightly pointed out, he wanted to make the debate about him and that issue. We need to keep the focus on the reason we carried out the report. We have a job of work to do to ensure there was value for money and proper examinations were carried out.

Having said that, it was outrageous that the Minister for Finance called on Deputy Fleming, as Chairman of this committee, to resign for doing his job. As I said yesterday in the Dáil, it is important that members of this committee reaffirm their confidence in him as Chair. I certainly have confidence in him as Chair. It was outrageous that he was asked to resign on the floor of the Dáil.

The Minister cast aspersions on members of the committee and its work. He claimed that we did not fairly carry out our work and did not conduct a proper examination. I take great offence at his claim because we sat here, as the Chairman knows. The members of this committee in this room were the ones who sat through nearly all of the hearings.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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Yes.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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We put an awful lot of personal work into this matter and not for personal gain. We just did our job, without fear or favour. We have a responsibility to protect the integrity of the Committee of Public Accounts. As I said yesterday and will say again, I was not a member of the previous Committee of Public Accounts. There seems to be a particular political slant on this committee during this term that was not evident in the past. That is deeply unfortunate because it is undermining the committee. That situation manifested itself on the floor of the Dáil Chamber yesterday. There were slurs made against my party, and against me personally, by the Minister. He did so simply because he was upset or annoyed about two words that were used in the report. If anything, we could have gone much further in our criticisms. Our report was very fair and we need to respond. I agree with Deputy McDonald that we cannot leave this matter at that. It would be completely unacceptable on our part. We have a responsibility to protect our integrity and that of the role of the Chair of the Committee of Public Accounts. We should do so by asking the Minister for an apology. He should have the good grace to make an apology.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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I call Deputy MacSharry.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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He availed of an opportunity to defend himself. In relation to the very serious allegations-----

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Through the Chair. Deputy MacSharry is the next speaker.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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We have just had an example of the interruptions. They happened a couple of times when Teachta Connolly spoke. Every time that we raise issues that are directed at the Minister or a Government representative, the Government representatives on the committee interrupt us. That makes it difficult for us to do our job. I do not interrupt Teachta Madigan when she makes her point nor does anybody else. It is not just her; it is all of the Fine Gael members.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Okay.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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I identified this pattern yesterday and it needs to be dealt with by the Chairman, with respect. Why the constant interruptions when we make points? A fair procedure would be to put one's hand up, wait until the person makes his or her point and if one disagrees with the person, then one can come back in. The constant interruptions are a source of irritation for those of us who simply want to do our job fairly.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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I call on Deputy MacSharry and I urge him to speak on this topic.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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Yes, I shall speak on this issue. There is no us. Deputies Cassells, Aylward, the Chairman and I do not meet upstairs on the fourth floor to decide what our angle is on any given day. I have the experience of having been a member of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform for quite a few years. I was also a member of the Joint Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis and recall that the debates during private session were extremely heated, and intra-party at times. Deputy Michael McGrath and I were on both committees, from a Fianna Fáil perspective. At times we were at each others throats, for want of a better expression, as was everybody else and we were also in dispute with the clerk to the committee and the committee secretariat at times. I am saddened by the politicisation of today's matter. Yes, it involved criticism being levelled at the office of the Minister for Finance in terms of the scheduling of a meeting, of which the timing was inappropriate. As I said in the House yesterday, it was absolutely clear, which the minutes prove, that the man was not in town to collect for the Red Cross. It was another timing matter in terms of meeting these people, if they wanted to, at some other date in time. That was wrong.

For different reasons some of us are absent for part or all of a meeting. At a critical stage when we were talking, and we had a lengthy discussion on the wording of the report, no Fine Gael representative was in the room. None. In fact, it was clear it was about to come up as the next item on the agenda.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We should stick to this topic.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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Nobody else's contribution was circumscribed so I will say what I want to say. The person of whom we speak is box office so they had to come in, all guns blazing, to defend this and that was totally inappropriate. I would speak much more strongly if I could get away with it but I will pick my words. It is disingenuous to accept the word "advisable" while, on the other hand, going against an entire report because en blocthey have decided as a party not to support it. My party colleagues, Deputies Cassells and Aylward, and I do not decide en blocwhat to do and I have not seen this happen in any committee in 15 years here. It is fundamentally wrong. I have great time for the Minister and I praised him in the House yesterday, as I have many times for his good actions through the years, but he must be losing some of his match fitness because it was an own goal to call for the head of one constitutional committee of the Oireachtas and to level abuse at the integrity of all people on the committee, including Fine Gael members. If they really feel as they say they do, why do they not resign from the committee?

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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Deputy Alan Kelly also voted for this.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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I did not mention any names. If anybody feels this room has been politicised, they should resign from the committee. We do not need them here.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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It is the other way around.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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I will not be resigning. If it is appropriate for me to criticise the actions of Deputy Micheál Martin on a given issue, I will not hesitate to do it. I did so in the banking inquiry, as Deputy Pearse Doherty and others will agree. On live television, I robustly questioned party colleagues who were also box office in my party. They would have respect at an Ard-Fheis but this is a long way away from Ard-Fheiseanna.

Anecdotal evidence suggests the Minister apologised to the Chairman yesterday and last night. If this is true, the committee should call for the Minister to repeat it in a public forum.

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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This is an unfortunate situation. The Committee of Public Accounts has to be beyond reproach and beyond politicisation and we need to embrace that from now on. I wanted to see unity in regard to reports and it was unfortunate it came down to literally one word. We have a lot of serious work to do and we need to deal with what happened yesterday and move on. We had some very serious issues regarding the Grace case last week and there are some outstanding questions. There are questions relating to the Garda Commissioner, who is before another committee next door. The issue is important to me because I represent the area. We are all capable of working together in a non-political way and I have seen the committee work together well. I am very proud of the way we can support one another in here, share information and work together on questions though politically we would be adversaries. We need to get back to what this committee is good at and move on. I do not mean we should forget about it but we need to deal with it and move onto the work programme - that is what we are here for. There is an incredible amount of work to do on some serious issues and we should focus on that. That is my priority as Vice Chairman.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Members have asked me questions and I will explain the full background. I explained previously that the sequence commences with the letter of 15 February 2017 from the Minister to this committee, which is reproduced in full in the report. Before the members had an opportunity to consider that letter, the Minister was before the finance committee dealing with Estimates. He took the opportunity to speak at that committee about the letter he had sent and that is fine. I read the last sentence of the letter which stated: "I am also sure that any conclusions which do materialise in the Committee's final report will be based on available evidence, due and fair process and logical reasoning which will withstand challenge." When I read this, I took it to refer to a legal challenge. The letter had that reference in it and I took it to mean that we were to be on notice that the report might be subject to challenge.

Later on the same day, in the restaurant, the Minister asked me to have a word and I agreed. I have good personal relations with the Minister, and the Minister has not disputed that this took place. He said we had not been fair and should have given him an opportunity to come in and speak to the committee. I replied that he had not been fair. He was here for five hours and was the only one in possession of the information. He could not accuse us of not asking him about things which he did not know of. The conversation continued about who had been unfair to whom and concluded with the Minister saying, "You know I can injunct you". That was the end of the conversation and, having read the letter a few hours earlier, I could see that this was the frame of mind the Minister was in when writing it. The extra bit was confirmation and an advance on the previous situation but it was not new ground. It was highly serious, nevertheless, and I told members of the committee.

It is important for the Committee of Public Accounts that I make this statement, which is broader than my discussion with the Minister. I think the fact that some people tried to put pressure on the committee when we issued our report did not undermine the committee but strengthened it. It will strengthen the committee to be seen as fearless and not prepared to take a rebuke from anybody. My priority as Chairman was to get a report agreed and I felt that to overelaborate further, notwithstanding that there was a reference to a legal threat in the letter, which every member could have read themselves, would further upset the possibility of getting an agreed report.

I am only new to this job since last year. I take it as normal that the Chairman of a Committee of Public Accounts will come under pressure from a variety of sources. I take it as par for the course and it does not influence how I am. I want to go on to talk about two further people who threatened legal action in respect of this committee and its proceedings.. First, in my conversations with the chairman of NAMA over a period, he first mentioned that legal advice was being considered but the high financial cost to NAMA was something that had to be taken into account. That remark did not influence me or my work here. I am just putting it on record.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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Legal advice on what?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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On our report, in that we were potentially making adverse findings against NAMA.

I am taking it a step further. Senior people in this House made it very clear to me as Chairman that if they were not happy with the wording in the report, they would prevent our report being issued and they would take it to the Committee on Procedures and Privilege to have it approved by it.

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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Did the Chairman say "senior people"?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Senior people. I am not going to name the officials-----

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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I do not need the Chairman to name names but are we talking TDs or Ministers?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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No, I am talking about senior officials, not the clerk to the committee.

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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In other words, senior people-----

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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In the Oireachtas.

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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-----who administer the committee process.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Yes.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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Was it the Clerk of the Dáil?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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For the moment, I am not going to name an official by name. That is standard practice.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Let us use his title. Was it the Clerk of the Dáil?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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No, let me clarify. I am not identifying the person here today but I am making it clear that senior officials, certainly not anybody in this room, made it very clear to me that if the wording was not to the satisfaction of what the House – they - felt was safe; that they had, under Standing Orders – I have not checked the Standing Orders - the authority to take our draft report to the CPP and it would decide whether it could be issued.

I am now making it very clear as Chairman of the Committee of Public Accounts, before this report is issued, that the question of legal challenge was raised with me by the Minister for Finance; NAMA raised with me that it was considering the issue; and senior officials in this House said they would consider their approach in terms of not allowing-----

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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Just for clarity of information-----

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Senior officials. I took it as par for the course in my job as Chairman to deal with that and move on.

I am now putting on record that I think the fact we did our work has strengthened the committee, despite people's efforts to undermine us. We are a stronger committee for it. With regard to NAMA, I have served on this committee for a couple of terms and, during those terms and perhaps this term, I have often been critical of the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and why issues were coming to light that had not been highlighted earlier. I was told NAMA had a dossier prepared of all my previous comments on the Comptroller and Auditor General over a period of several years and that, if we were backing up the Comptroller and Auditor General, that would be used to show that I had no problem criticising him on previous occasions but was not necessarily going down that road now. I was made aware that was there. I have no problem; I am proud of everything I have said during previous PAC meetings.

I am just saying, as Chairman, I have come under pressures from three sources, none of which influenced me one way or the other in terms of completing our work. I actually think we are stronger for having withstood that pressure, despite people's efforts to limit what we might actually say. The conversation with the Minister is there.

On Deputy MacSharry’s point, I personally hold no personal angst against the Minister for Finance. We are here a long time and we have good, friendly and cordial relations. He came over to me last night during the course of the vote on the floor of the House to shake my hand and ask if we could make up and move on. We shook hands and said, "Let us move on." There is no personal angst but there is a serious professional disagreement between us.

I know people will be surprised by what I am saying. In our report, there are two paragraphs out of 101 pages in respect of our comments on the Minister. There are three full pages from the Minister on his view of what we had to say about him. In fact, in terms of fairness, he has been given far more space for his views. For anyone to suggest he did not have an opportunity, there are three pages of a letter from him on his views of the matter in our report. That is more than fair play.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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I accept in the first instance that the Chairman used his judgment on all these issues and his intentions were honourable in how he dealt with all of the threats, I suppose, made against him personally as chair of the committee. He is right that it is par for the course in terms of the role he sits in, and that this will happen from time to time. However, to be fair to members of this committee, when we are preparing a report, if there is a threat of that nature from a Minister for Finance, we should be aware of it. Certainly if there were threats from senior officials – and I think we should know who that senior official is because that senior official tried to thwart the work of this committee, not you personally as Chairman but all of us - we should have been made aware of that notwithstanding the Chairman’s assertion that it strengthened us because we carried on regardless. We would have done that anyway. With respect, that information should have been shared with us, although I accept the Chairman used his judgment. On the exchanges in the Dáil yesterday, comments were made publicly in the Dáil by the Minister. It is not acceptable that you just have two boys who shake hands and make up. That is politics of old.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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That was personal.

Photo of David CullinaneDavid Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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Yes, but it is no value to me or anyone else on this committee because it was the committee that was attacked and Deputy Fleming is our Chairman. As the comments were made in the Dáil Chamber, they need to be corrected there. I agree with Deputy MacSharry, we need the Minister – if he did offer an apology – to offer it in public at the next available opportunity, not just to you, as Chairman, but to the members of the Committee of Public Accounts for the slight in his comments on the work of this committee. I am not interested in personal handshakes during a vote. It is not good enough. We need to write to the Minister to ask that the apology be given in public in the Dáil.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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To clarify, I have asked the clerk to outline for us whatever Standing Orders are available to people in the House regarding committee reports - I am not aware of every Standing Order - and the procedures in place whereby reports or draft reports can be referred to the CPP. I would like that to be summarised and presented to us in the afternoon. It may be something we were not fully aware of; I was surprised to hear it. I presume it is in Standing Orders.

Photo of Josepha MadiganJosepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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I am a member of the CPP, in case the senior official is referred to the CPP for whatever sanction that may be. I am only new to this committee and I know we must protect its autonomy. Despite what other members may believe, as a Fine Gael member, I have always endeavoured to do that and use my own integrity and bona fides.

I do not want to discredit the Chairman’s character because he said he made judgments at the time but I do not accept those judgments. He should have revealed those serious allegations – and they are only allegations. We are hearing from the Chairman what the Minister for Finance said to him. We do not know what his answer to that is. Going on the Chairman’s comments, he did not offer an apology last night. It sounds like they shook hands but I did not hear the Chairman refer to an apology.

The letter from February 2017 uses the term to "withstand challenge". That does not necessarily mean a legal challenge. That could just mean withstanding probity or further scrutiny and, therefore, I do not accept that. There are serious allegations. We want to move on but I am extremely disappointed by the way this has been handled. We should have been given that information; the Minister should have an opportunity to defend himself on this.

Photo of Catherine ConnollyCatherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I thank the Chairman for withstanding the pressure. We felt pressure on this with the continuous leaks. The person who leaked did it deliberately and shamefully and if he or she is within this room, I hope he or she looks within himself or herself. I reiterate that we should have no more private meetings. We should take the power back to the committee.

Second, we have three third level institutions waiting for us. We have attended diligently, particularly the Chairman. I realise as Chairman of an Irish language committee it is not easy. There is additional pressure on him with constant correspondence from people. We have been flooded with e-mails even in respect of the universities about serious issues. People are calling themselves whistleblowers and so on. We are the last hope for them and it is extremely difficult. We are here now, we return for another meeting at 2.30 p.m. and we met yesterday.

The Chairman has gone through a number of issues.

The Minister had every opportunity last night to say the Chairman was not telling the truth or that he was wrong and he did not do so. In fact, he left the Chamber. I understand last night's debate was rearranged twice to facilitate the Minister being present. When it came up last night, he came in and left shortly after his contribution. He had an opportunity to contribute later and say that the Chairman was wrong about what he said and he did not take it. Therein lies an answer.

To think that the Chairman was told that NAMA had a dossier on him referring to all his previous criticisms is truly shocking. The fact that NAMA officials were speaking to him is in itself shocking because he is simply Chairman of the committee and we are all equal. If NAMA, the Minister or any senior official had anything to say, they should have written to us and the Chairman should then have highlighted the correspondence, as he always does. That was not done. If we focus on the politics, that ignores the most serious threat to democracy. From day one, I said the Comptroller and Auditor General's report was a rational, reasonable, mild report, which highlighted concerns about a sales process. NAMA went into full attack mode rather than asking what is in this. I believe it was not even read in total and they picked out a 10% or 5% discount rate and zoned in on that with tunnel vision as opposed to what the report was about, which was accountability and holding a system to account. NAMA officials could have come in and said, "We agree retrospectively. We should have followed up the conflict of interest but we were under enormous pressure." They did nothing like that and went on the attack over a small section.

The Minister did the exact same. There are 32 conclusions and, in the Dáil last night, he said we were "conjuring up criticism". He said that twice. I am delighted the Chairman has made up with the Minister because it is important to have cordial relations. However, men shaking hands - or as I used to refer to them on the city council, the boys in the short pants - is not good enough. It is good for them to do that and I am delighted for the Chairman but boys shaking hands does nothing for me and nothing for openness and accountability. These are serious issues. We need to deal with this serious threat to the committee and the democratic process.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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I have to leave in ten minutes for a short period and the Vice-Chairman will take the Chair.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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We now have elaborated on the position. It is not just the Minister who has threatened to injunct. We have had similar sabre rattling from NAMA. Was it Mr. Frank Daly who spoke to the Chairman about the issue around legal action and NAMA?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Yes.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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So now we have the head of NAMA, the Minister and officials sabre rattling with the committee.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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They would probably say it was to protect the committee.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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It is a matter of fact that any of those parties could, and would, legally scrutinise our work and if they were so moved, they could intervene if they believed there was something legally unsound in the report or that they had been impugned in some dramatic way by the work of the committee. However, focusing on that misses the point. There are forces within the system which wish to thwart our work. People can call me a cynic but I am not hugely surprised to hear that because the experience on this committee is that at a certain point during the previous term the system intervened, not because we were doing a bad job but we were doing too good a job and that caused a problem. We need a simple assertion from the committee, irrespective of our political stripe, that we are here to do the work of the citizens and of those who send us here and no Minister, officials or head of any State agency will get in our way. However, we need to be single minded in that regard. The Chairman should have shared this information with us. I will not second guess his honourable position in making the call he made but it was a mistake. It is important that we understand that there are those who wish to thwart our work and we cannot allow our work to be thwarted.

What do we do next? We need the Minister to apologise to the committee. To suggest we are "conjuring up" allegations or findings is outrageous and is beneath a member of Cabinet. He needs to clarify that. I do not know what we do regarding the official if the Chairman is not prepared to name who it is. I am sure there is a Standing Order that facilitates a report to be-----

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We will get to the bottom of it.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Yes, let us get to the bottom of it and let us hope that this episode does in fact strengthen the committee and does not make people cynical. As far as I am concerned, nobody will stand in the way of us doing the work we are sent here to do. We should have been told about this. It is not good that we got wind of this on the floor of the Dáil. I am delighted the Chairman made friends with Deputy Noonan. Fair play to him.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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That is not the issue.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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It absolutely is not but neither would I like the Chairman to think the resolution to this is a handshake or a quiet word between two lads. This is the Oireachtas; we are democratically elected politicians.

The other issue is given the abuse the constitutional Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General received, we probably got off rather tightly and we should not be surprised by these bullying tactics. This is political bullying. These are bully boys in action and they will not bully us.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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I have a few brief questions. On the official who involved himself or herself, was it on a specific issue? Was it on the wording of specific recommendations?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Yes. First, it was not a threat. He was apprising me of the Standing Orders of the House - that the CPP has the authority to consider any draft report. I take it the official was, to use his words, "trying to be helpful" to me by explaining to me Standing Orders of which I may not have been aware. It was not a threat, but it means ultimately – which I regard as a far more serious issue and we will get the Standing Orders – the committee can actually conclude a report but may not be allowed to issue it. That was news to me and we need to get that issue clarified. I was being apprised of that fact. That is a simple issue. We will find the Standing Order and the procedures involved. The matter has not been teased out; I was just apprised of it. We will get to the bottom of that.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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Was the determination of whomever advised the Chairman to the effect that, "Look, you had better get this right because the committee can and will examine, or has indicated it may examine, it and I am just filling you in”? What was the context?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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It was in the context of the final drafting of the report.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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Was it in the context of a particular part of the final draft?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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No, if the Deputy remembers for the last two or three meetings, we had the legal advisers here who suggested textual changes where we were concentrating overly on individuals rather than offices. It was in the general context of the advice we were receiving from the Office of the Parliamentary Legal Adviser, which was assisting us in the final drafting of the report. They made no substantive changes but did make some textual changes we all accepted.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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So, if the Committee on Procedures and Privilege is so determined, it can delay the publication of the report?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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I am not sure. I cannot answer that now; we will get the answer. The answer to that question on procedures, which I have never encountered, is in the House.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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On the NAMA interventions with the chairman, was it the case that they told him he should know they have the goods on him? Or was it a case of them telling the chairman they wanted to protect him because this was the type of stuff that they would be dealing with?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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I do not have the name of the person, but it was not the chairman who said that to me. I did refer previously to a conversation with the chairman of NAMA. The context of the conversation on the issue was that some people are suggesting there was an issue of the cost. He was not saying it was going to happen. He did not indicate that to me, he said it was a possibility, I did not take it that it was going to happen from the conversation. He just said it was a possibility.

Will we conclude?

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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I want to run through a few things before we conclude. There were a couple of references to old boys' club, I know it is irrelevant but the gender of the two individuals to me is absolutely irrelevant to this discussion, whether it is old boys' club or old girls' club.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Except their politics is an old boys' club and not an old girls' club, just to state that factually. The Deputy might look around himself.

Photo of Marc MacSharryMarc MacSharry (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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The new old boys' club is equal opportunities.

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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The Chairman said that when the senior official gave advice and was being helpful, but obviously he thought it was hostile or threatening in some way.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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Advice can be good or bad.

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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Did the Chairman feel that there was an agenda behind the advice being given?

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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During that period, the parliamentary legal advisor was assisting us in terms of wording and references to individuals, sitting there for a couple of the final meetings. It was in that context he made me aware of something I had no knowledge of.

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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I do not think any of us were aware of this. If that is there we need to change it because the idea that we could do a report and the next thing it could be culled is incredible.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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It is worth remembering we are a committee of the House, we are not the House.

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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Absolutely, but I wanted to know if the Chairman felt that in his being approached, there was an agenda.

Photo of Seán FlemingSeán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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No, it was in the context of the discussion we were having.

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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Second, on to the three areas which the Chairman outlined where he felt that people had approached him in different ways, I support him in his using his discretion as to how he was going to reveal this. It is important we all do for the simple reason that if the Chairman had to reveal some of this at the time, the whole thing would have been taken over. What would have happened? We have to trust his discretion and he is the Chairman.

Finally, I mentioned moving on earlier and the need to get on with the work programme. We obviously have to have this discussion and there will be follow-up in regard to the issues which have arisen from it, but one thing that has not yet been referred to, and it is deeply disturbing and worrying. The facts are that this committee did not cover itself in glory in the way there were so many leaks, we do not know how. The draft report was leaked. However it was leaked, we will never know. We need to move on in our work in a different way.

Sitting suspended at 10.10 a.m. and resumed at 10.15 a.m.

Deputy Alan Kelly took the Chair.