Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

Go raibh maith agat, a Chathaoirligh. The Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board is a company limited by guarantee. The company was established by the Turf Club and the Irish National Hunt Steeplechase Committee with effect from 1 January 2018 for the purpose of carrying out the regulatory and licensing functions for Irish horse racing, as provided for in the Horse Racing Ireland Act 2016. The members of the board are appointed by the Turf Club and the Irish National Hunt Steeplechase Committee. The board has a number of statutory functions under the Irish Horseracing Industry Act 1994, as amended, including responsibility for making and enforcing the rules of racing, and decisions on handicapping for races; provision of integrity services for horse racing, including doping control and forensic testing; and licensing of all participants in horse racing in Ireland.

The board is funded mainly by grants from Horse Racing Ireland, and licence fees received from trainers and jockeys collected on the board's behalf by Horse Racing Ireland. The budget prepared by the board is submitted to and agreed annually with Horse Racing Ireland. The board received funding of €10.2 million from Horse Racing Ireland in 2021. This accounted for 88% of its income in the year. The board also received €1.4 million in licence fee income. The board generated a small profit in the year, having expended €7.8 million on integrity services, and €3.9 million on administrative expenses. The 2021 financial statements received a clear audit opinion.

However, without qualifying that opinion, my report drew attention to two matters. First, the code of practice for the governance of State bodies issued by the Minister for Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform requires public bodies to disclose certain information in their annual financial statements. This includes details of the remuneration paid to the chief officer of the public body, and staff remuneration by salary bands. This is standard practice among the public bodies I audit, and I draw attention to any material non-compliance that I find.

The Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board was granted an exemption by the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, which meant that it did not have to make the salary disclosures in the 2018-20 financial statements. In May 2022, the Minister wrote to the board requesting that its 2021 and subsequent financial statements should disclose both the normal salary band information and the remuneration of the chief executive, to include all short-term benefits and any termination benefits, if relevant. As outlined in note 10, the board has not complied with the Minister's request to make the disclosures in the 2021 financial statement, and therefore, is not compliant with the code of practice.

The second matter is that an early retirement and voluntary redundancy scheme was made available to the board's staff on 11 May 2021. Subsequently, the then chief executive applied for, and was granted, early retirement. A formal agreement was concluded with him on 11 June 2021, providing for his departure with effect from 30 September of that year. The terms of the agreement included a termination payment of €384,870. This exceeded by €141,880, or 58%, the amount payable to the chief executive if the scheme conditions advertised to staff had been applied. It was clearly stated that there would be no exceptions to the scheme conditions. The payment amount agreed with and paid to the chief executive was a significant exception to the early retirement scheme terms.