Ms Tara Keane:

The Revenue Commissioners, by default, are included in the rescue plan but they have the option to remove themselves based on confined statutory grounds. These all relate to issues where tax returns are outstanding or where the company has a poor history of compliance. The reason we have included this is that when an examiner is appointed, the court will invite the Revenue Commissioners to make a submission on the tax history of the company and confirm the outstanding debts to the State. That does not happen here; they do not have that opportunity so we have included the measure as a safeguard to protect moneys owed to the Irish people. We have drawn the section from the Personal Insolvency Act 2012, which also provides for the Revenue Commissioners to be excludable. The difference, however, is that we have said they can have the option to exclude themselves only on statutory grounds, as opposed to having a carte blanche to exclude themselves. The Revenue Commissioners have indicated to us that, on the personal insolvency side, in circumstances where they are in a position to quantify the debt, they have opted in to over 90% of cases and they have no reason they would not engage in the same manner under this process.