Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael)

I thank the Minister of State for being honest and open about this. It would be useful for the agreement to be published, given the scale of the funding involved and the new sections to be added. I welcome the fact the Minister of State has given a commitment to publish the agreement and it might be laid in the Library.

To return to Deputy Quinn's point, my understanding is that with any funding in the Department of Education and Science Vote which goes through either a statutory body, a college or a body with which we have an agreement, such as the alliance, those audited accounts come to the attention of the Oireachtas Committee on Education and Science. We regularly peruse accounts coming from institutes of technology or a board like the National Council for Special Education etc. Will the Minister of State give some consideration to the legislation between now and its passage through the Seanad to see if he can include the right of the committee to peruse the accounts? It would be an important oversight function should the committee decide to do it.

There is probably no difficulty in the committee doing this at the moment. Under the normal framework we operate, these matters come to our table on a regular basis. It would be useful, particularly for voices in America who are sceptical of all kinds of issues I am unaware of, for an Oireachtas committee to question the accounts when they become available on a yearly basis.

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