Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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This is a point of particular interest as it relates to contracts pertaining to direct provision that were transferred from the Department of Justice to the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth. According to the Secretary General, Mr. Fergal Lynch, the previous Department, namely, the Department of Justice, had a view that the contracts were competitive and not applicable for inclusion in the return under circular 40/2002, but this Accounting Officer took a different view. This indicates a difference in interpretation across the board, given that one Department can take a diametrically different view from another about the same contract, and it therefore raises broader questions about different contracts. Could Mr. McCarthy comment on whether there are varying levels of compliance issues across Departments? This correspondence affirms that there is a subjective view to all of this.

The committee should accept the offer of a more detailed breakdown being provided on a confidential basis. That would be useful to our deliberations. We are going to be discussing the report on direct provision, following on from our consideration of the Department of Justice's report. Before we finally sign off on that, it would be good if we could get a briefing from the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth in respect of the progress to date on its commitment to dismantle the direct provision system.