Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We are joined by the Comptroller and Auditor General, Mr. Seamus McCarthy, who is a permanent witness to the committee. He is accompanied by Ms Georgina O'Mahony, deputy director of audit. No apologies have been received.

The first business on the agenda is the minutes of the meeting of 25 May 2017. Are they agreed? Agreed. Matters arising from the minutes will be covered in what we will discuss shortly.

The next business is correspondence. Nos. 525A and 545A are a Revenue briefing document and an opening statement for today's meeting. We will note and publish them.

Category B relates to correspondence from Accounting Officers and-or Ministers and follow-ups from previous meetings. First in that group is No. 526B, correspondence dated 22 May from Bord na gCon providing a copy of its market strategy as requested during our engagement with it two weeks ago. We will note and publish it.

Next is category C correspondence from an individual dated 19 May, which includes an excerpt from a transcript of the 13 April committee meeting inquiring whether it referred to him. The clerk has already written to him confirming that it does. The individual states that there were three breaches of the Data Protection Acts when the secretariat forwarded three unredacted pieces of correspondence from the individual concerned to the Arts Council, he does not accept that the matter is closed as stated by myself at the last meeting when this matter was dealt with and he has no record of receiving an apology from the clerk, the committee or me for the breach.

To clarify the matter, the committee wrote once to the Arts Council on 18 November 2016 and attached three items from the individual that were unredacted. This was an oversight and the secretariat has tightened its systems to try to ensure that this does not happen again. It has also provided an explanation to the Data Protection Commissioner regarding the error as part of her examination of the matter.

I reiterate that the reason we forwarded the individual's correspondence was to ensure that the issues as raised by the correspondence to us were put to the Arts Council. However, we fully accept that the same objective could have been achieved by redacting the individual's name and personal details and that not doing so was regrettable.

Is it agreed that we write to the individual and apologise to him for the oversight in not redacting his personal details? Agreed.

No. 519C is correspondence dated 19 May from John McCarthy, Secretary General of the Department of Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government, updating the committee on land purchases by Galway County Council. He states he has requested the director of audit of the local government audit service to consider the matter and expects to hear from her in early Autumn on this issue. Is it agreed to note this? Agreed.