Ms Éimear Fisher:

Many members have raised questions on this issue. I think some of the issues have been raised because the general scheme does not cover some of these issues. Some of the issues raised were in regard to the detail of the service level agreement and the contract that will be conducted between the Minister and the national service provider. Obviously we can revert to the committee in assisting it in understanding that. By its nature it cannot be in the general scheme because that would be very prescriptive and we want to be flexible.

On the question of the payments mechanism, a payments mechanism process of the sort that would be required for something at this level does not exist in the Department. There is a payments mechanism process in Tusla. It is akin to a banking system that is not responsible for the actual daily invoices and looking at the quality of the work that is being carried out by the different guardians ad litemor the amount of time they were in court or the actual substance of the invoice. The substance of the invoice and the financial management of that would be a matter for the service provider, which would be monitored by the Department, and that would be very closely monitored under the service level agreement. We are in consultation at present with the Office for Government Procurement in regard to how best to set it up, and it is advising us very closely on that. What we have tried to do, as the Minister has been pointing out, is to distance Tusla from the process of being in contact with individual guardians ad litem themselves from the point of view of maintaining the independence of the individual guardians ad litem, while at the same time, given the necessity to speed up and improve the current system as urgently as possible, which we all recognise has deficiencies, to have that payment mechanism, that banking system in Tusla so that it can process the payments. The service level agreement with the service provider will provide more detail on that and we can come back to the committee as necessary.