Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)

In the limited time available to me I wish to address my comments to the Minister of State present in the House, Deputy Billy Kelleher. I suggest to him, as the Minister of State with responsibility in this area, that he has a particular responsibility to bring the Secretary General of the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment to account and to ask him what he was doing about the four departmental representatives on the board, namely, representatives from the Departments of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Finance, Education and Science and Social and Family Affairs. He must ask whether they met as a collective group and whether they conferred. This was body that was receiving €1 billion in funding. We are not speaking of a small semi-State agency but of a massive organisation, as already outlined by Deputy Sherlock.

What type of co-ordination existed on the part of the Secretary General? It is easy, politically, for us to lambaste the Minister of the day and for us to perhaps refer to some members of the board. However, if a board is in the position whereby the truth is being withheld from it, it has limited capacity to act. I recall that when I was Minister for Enterprise and Employment, previously Minister for Labour, there was a much tighter and closer understanding between the Department of Labour, civil servants and some sections of what was then AnCO, which was as Deputy Mattie McGrath stated FÁS's previous incarnation.

I understand that talks and hearings on this issue will be ongoing between the Committee of Public Accounts, other relevant committees and the Secretary General of the Department of Education and Science. It behoves the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment and the Minister of State, Deputy Kelleher, as the Minister with political responsibility in this area to find out where was the management breakdown in his Department that allowed these things to happen. What is the point of ministerial appointments to boards of an organisation if such people do not act as a watchdog for the primary Department and other Departments? This is a failure of public service. The relevant sections in the senior echelons of public service in this country who have served us well need to start looking into their dark souls and to ask themselves hard questions. How is it even acceptable that someone who has so manifestly failed in public management, Mr. Rody Molloy, was so outrageously rewarded?

I listened to the Minister of State's contribution and read carefully the opening statement made by my colleague, Deputy Shortall and the inadequate response from the Minister, Deputy Coughlan, in regard to the terms and legalities of the settlement on which we will not finish our deliberations tonight. There are other institutions within this House where this will be pursued. I am of the view that the law was not complied with. Contradictory statements have been given on a number of occasions, not by the Minister of State, Deputy Kelleher, but by others with political responsibility. This is an issue that will not go away. We will, when the Bill to appoint the new board of FÁS comes before the House, have an opportunity to ask questions about its formation, nomination, role and accountability to the primary Department. The Minister of State may not hold his current portfolio for much longer or may, perhaps, hold it for another two years. He has a responsibility not to look at the departed board members but to ask why it was that a Department like his with such a large budget and an extraordinary amount of money going to FÁS, systematically failed to detect that something wrong was happening at management level. The Minister of State has a responsibility to ask the Secretary General of his Department what was going on. I suggest, for example, that he ask him where was the monthly report from the civil servant from his Department on the board of FÁS and whether the representatives of the other three Departments forward a monthly report to his Department. Were they co-ordinated? What was the State getting from the participation of those people on the board?

I am focusing in deference to time on this narrow point. There are many other comments I could make on many other areas but time does not permit me to do so. I want to deliberately return the spotlight to the Minister of State, Deputy Kelleher, as the political person with responsibility in this area for which he is accountable to this House and to the Secretary General of the Department and officials from that Department and the other three Departments who sat side by side with the external social partner appointees. I ask the Minister of State to come back into this House and give us a report in that regard at some stage.

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