Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)

I note the points made by Deputy Broughan and by the Minister. Deputy Broughan and I spent many years on the Committee of Public Accounts and we learned a great deal. We learned much about allowances, remuneration and expenses for State and semi-State bodies. Serious questions were raised in the committee about how approval was given for consultancies. Arising from those experiences, I felt that it would be good to amend section 18(1) by adding "subject to the approval of the Minister". I do not think there is anything wrong with that. The Minister stated that it was provided for elsewhere when dealing with the levy, and that is true, but it is not provided for in this section. I do not see why it should not be subject to the provisions in the other part of the Bill outlined by the Minister.

We need to ensure that the Minister and the agency are responsible to the Houses of the Oireachtas, which does not mean second-guessing them. In several cases, provision is made for the Minister and the Minister for Finance to approve. I take the point made by Deputy Broughan that it is an internal function of the industry, but I am not so certain that it is. A consultant may advise a Minister that it is appropriate to engage a consultant to advise in a particular way. Depending on who the consultant is, the whole thing might be a foregone conclusion. There might be no way of monitoring the consultant and he or she could come up with anything. The electronic voting system is a classic example of something that got away from us. It took on a life of its own and nobody had any regard for it. Public money went after public money and there was no accountability.

In this situation, there is no harm in laying down new criteria whereby we intervene on behalf of the taxpayer. Let us stop apologising to everybody outside the House for doing so. If we are serious about our job, we should do it that way. We should include provisions that require ministerial approval for consultants. If it is in some other section of the Bill but not in this section, why not? I do not accept the notion that we should let it happen in this fashion. There are too many occasions in which Ministers and the Houses have been hijacked by decisions taken on the basis of advice given by consultants who were employed to give an appraisal——

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