Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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We will also ask if there are any rollover provisions, whether this goes back out to tender or whether the two present companies have the contract.

No. 2106B, dated 11 April, is from Mr. Aidan O'Driscoll, Secretary General at the Department of Justice and Equality, and provides information requested by the committee following previous correspondence in respect of the Prison Service. We asked for an update regarding compensation paid in cases of prisoners who died from self-inflicted injuries in custody since 2017. We have been told that there have been no payments. We also asked about potential claims or claims lodged in respect of an outbreak of tuberculosis within the Irish Prison Service. The response from the Department of Justice and Equality advises that the State Claims Agency has stated that it has received 100 claims. Of those, 66 were concluded on 25 January 2019. Further information has been requested.

We will write to the State Claims Agency asking it to supply information regarding the sums of money involved and the estimated cost for dealing with the remaining cases. We will also request information on whether any confidentiality agreements were attached to the conclusion of those 66 claims. I have not seen reference to that in public. Representatives from the State Claims Agency will appear before this committee in due course. More importantly, we also want to know the learning process for the Prison Service to ensure health issues such as this are prevented in future. In this instance, there was not just a lack of prevention but the disease spread to 100 people. We need a response on this issue. We will note and publish this.

No. 2116B, dated 12 April 2019, is from Ms Susanna Lyons, head of regulation with the Housing Agency, and provides the clarification requested by the committee regarding the number of housing units and a breakdown of the roles performed by the 10,000 staff in approved housing bodies, AHBs. It is stated that housing is only a small fraction of the work undertaken by many of the organisations that are approved housing bodies. Some of those bodies are charities and many deal with several other issues that are primarily funded in the context of the health service, such as patient care, health and social care, professional support day services, respite services and management of administration. The correspondence also gives a further breakdown of the information.

I will pick one as an example. The Irish Wheelchair Association has 2,638 staff but only 46 houses. The way this information was presented the last time we dealt with this matter could have led to an interpretation that there are 10,000 people in these charities dealing with housing. It is stated that the actual number of staff directly involved with housing is 1,236. A further breakdown of the information stated that 85% of the previous figure was given in respect of 12 or 13 major charities and it went on to give the number of staff in each charity involved with housing. Only 1,236 of the 10,000 staff in all of those organisations are involved in housing. That is important. We are doing a periodic report on housing shortly and that is an important clarification of information. We will note and publish this.

No. 2093C, dated 8 April 2019, is from an individual requesting the committee to pursue an investigation into a matter raised with this committee almost 20 years ago. The correspondent is seeking the release of precedential test cases used by the Social Welfare Appeals Office to determine issues in respect of employment, self-employment or bogus self-employment. The individual concerned has been in touch with the Office of the Ombudsman and the Social Welfare Appeals Office. He has also asked for the precedent from the High Court. I am not sure if the precedent being used is internal or is based on a court decision. If it is a court decision, then is it in the public domain and I do not see any issue with that.

We will write to the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection and ask for the rationale being relied on regarding these test cases. We are here to protect the taxpayer. There might be a good reason it is in the taxpayers' interest to not publish all of the information the Social Welfare Appeals Office uses to arrive at decisions of this type. It might perhaps be the case that if it was known how these decisions were arrived at, it might be possible to navigate a way around potential issues at a cost to the taxpayer. We do not want to bring about the release of any confidential information that could be used against interests of taxpayers. We do, however, want to see the rationale being used. We will see what response we will get and then determine if we want to pursue this matter further. We will note and publish this.

No. 2099C, dated 9 April 2019, is from an individual alleging a waste of public moneys by the Road Safety Authority, RSA, in the production of a compact disc, CD, for people with disabilities. The amount involved is €35,000. The correspondent states that the CD could have been produced at a much lower cost through the National Council for the Blind of Ireland, NCBI. We will write to the RSA, including correspondence from the individual and the NCBI, regarding the manuals and, in particular, people with dyslexia who are taking tests. We will forward this correspondence to the RSA and ask for a detailed note in response.

No. 2109C, dated 8 April 2019, is from an individual who has previously written to the committee regarding the election observer roster. The correspondent believes that the information provided by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is defamatory. The secretariat has reviewed the paragraph and no individual is mentioned. I propose we advise the correspondent to raise the matter directly with the Department. If the Department wishes to take its own legal advice on the matter and the result is a desire for the committee to have a correction inserted in the record, we will be happy to do so. We did not, however, identify anybody. The person concerned may feel that he or she was identified but he or she was not identified by this committee. If this matter comes back to us through the Department with a recommendation to re-examine it, we can note what is requested at that stage.

No. 2113C, dated 11 April 2019, is from an individual alleging fraud and criminality in Meath County Council in respect of public contracts and alleged conflicts of interest. We had similar correspondence on this matter but the local authorities do not fall within the remit of this committee. We will write to the correspondent to state that this matter is not within the remit of the Committee of Public Accounts and to suggest that he or she writes to the local government auditor or the appropriate office that carries out audits for local authorities.

No. 2118C, dated 15 April 2019, is from Deputy Catherine Murphy with a query for the Comptroller and Auditor General regarding grant payments from the reconciliation fund.