Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 19 April 2018

Public Accounts Committee

2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 5 - Fiscal Transparency

9:00 am

Mr. William Beausang:

That is an important point on the risks that are there if the accounts do not have the coverage that they ought to. Colleagues from the Department of Finance may be able to expand on this, but much progress has been made in the presentation of our fiscal accounts and improving the institutional coverage. As far as public expenditure matters are concerned, the IMF raised two specific matters, namely, the recording of pension liabilities and the recording of public private partnership, PPP, liabilities. Although they are not formally integrated into our accounts, there is much more information provided on those aspects of the public finances than there was in the past. Finance has led on a particular initiative in capturing our fiscal risks, which is a very important response to the issue raised in the IMF report and is a very important part of the fiscal documentation. Mr. McCarthy might wish to add to that.