Mr. Darragh O'Loughlin:

There are details that I unfortunately will not be able to provide today for fear of prejudicing any review or investigation that has yet to take place. All I can say is that while I was preparing for this meeting, given that it relates to the 2021 financial statements, I was preparing by reviewing those statements and then subsequent, post balance sheet events, to better understand these statements to ensure that I could answer any reasonably anticipated questions here. In the course of that preparation, I became aware of an issue that had occurred in early 2022. It does not form part of these financial statements, which is potentially a relevant matter. It related to governance around financial transactions. When I became aware of the issue, I immediately ended the preparatory meeting for this meeting today and I made contact with the independent chair of our audit and risk committee to report my concerns to him.

Having reported my concerns to the chair of the audit and risk committee, I made contact with the chairman of the board of the IHRB to inform him of my concerns and took legal advice. We convened a meeting of the directors of the IHRB yesterday morning. The board met, took legal advice and made certain decisions. Immediately following the board meeting, I made contact with our colleagues in the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General to advise them of all the facts that I had in my possession. After that, I made contact with Horse Racing Ireland, as our funding body. I spoke with the chief executive to make her aware of all the facts as I had them in my possession at the time. Following that, I made contact with senior officials in the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine again to step them through what had come to my attention and to give them all the facts so they could advise the Minister.

With the assistance of the chief executive of IHRB, we have identified an independent firm which does not currently do any work for the IHRB, which will be carrying out a review of all the circumstances around the matter that I am afraid I cannot describe. The terms of reference of that review were drafted with the assistance of our legal advisers. I expect it will be a thorough and extensive review, at the end of which a full report will be published which will be informative to all of us and will make clear at that stage what it is that, unfortunately, I am not able to tell the committee today.