Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 8 May 2018

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach

State Claims Agency: Discussion

1:30 pm

Mr. Ciarán Breen:

We have to look at every case because the particulars of negligence will differ from case-to-case. Our statement said, and we want to be very clear about it, that if the State has any liability in these cases we will clearly be dealing with them in a particular way, which is to ensure that injured parties do not go through the kind of trauma that Vicky Phelan had to go through in terms of, for example, a court trial. That is where we can establish that the State has a liability. If, on the other hand, the liability is that of the laboratory, quite clearly it will be indemnifying us and we will be out of the case.