Mr. Michael Culhane:

In terms of the issues that were identified in the college - for example, the resolution of the legal issues surrounding the status of the employees and the land issue - and has already been alluded to, none of them could be resolved without the input of the Department of Justice and Equality, the Chief State Solicitor's office and the Attorney General's office. They will always be high-ticket items in terms of being public events. One of the recommendations was that the land would be transferred to the OPW. That would have been picked up in the OPW's accounts and an explanation for where the land had come from would then have had to have been provided to the Comptroller and Auditor General. It was always going to be the case that the resolution of these matters would be in the public domain. As such, I did not seek to hide it or minimise the importance of these events.