Conor McGuinness (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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To protect you and confuse the Chair. My apologies. We have Mr. Conall O'Connor, assistant principal officer, and Mr. Joe Gallagher, assistant principal officer.

While the Minister of State may call on his officials to speak briefly for clarification purposes where a specific or technical point arises, I remind members the Minister of State is the witness for this meeting and the officials are not. The officials can clarify issues for the committee but any follow-up questions should be put to the Minister of State directly as he is the accountable person before the committee. The Minister of State has five minutes to give his opening statement, or he can give a briefer summary if he prefers. Then we will proceed to questions and answers.

As our joint committee meeting will be convened at 11.30 a.m. and there is need for a 15-minute break between meetings, I request that members keep questions concise and targeted to the matters at hand.