Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)

I will begin by responding to one point made by my colleague Deputy Ó Snodaigh. For many years, I have heard about the diminishing amount in the dormant accounts fund. I can never understand this. Dormant accounts, as the description entails, should mean they are accounts that become dormant in the natural course of events over a period of years. However, that should be an ongoing development and this should not only apply to last year, five years ago or ten years ago. However dormant accounts occurred, the same occurrence must continue into the future, unless there is some point I do not understand.

I raised this issue previously by way of parliamentary questions in recent years. While the replies to those questions stated the funds accruing from the dormant accounts were diminishing, I still do not understand how this could be. Dormant accounts occurred as a result of people being untraceable and their accounts falling into the hands of the lending institutions at a time before the Dormant Accounts Board was set up by the State. I was a member of the Committee of Public Accounts at the time the investigation took place which was the foundation of, and as a result of which agreement was reached on the setting up of, the dormant accounts fund. I agree with other speakers that a great deal of very useful work has been carried out through the funding that came from that body over the years. However, I must return to my original point. If accounts became dormant during, say, a ten year period in the 1980s and the fund then grew in the 1990s, which would have happened unless moneys were disbursed to some or other quarter, which would have diminished the fund, nonetheless, there would always be a naturally upcoming tranche of newly dormant accounts that would be transferred to the dormant accounts fund for disbursement at the discretion of the board.

I cannot for the life of me understand how the incoming amounts could have diminished or slowed down. Surely the same number of people are dying as died before and the same average number of people are dying intestate or dying without having left any direction in respect of insurance investments or bank accounts. The question arises, therefore, as to the amount which is about to be transferred having diminished. I have no difficulty with the transfer to the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government and I have no doubt the funding will be disbursed in a proper and orderly way. The question remains, however, as to why the fund should be diminishing. The answer always given, of course, has been that the funds have been disbursed. How did the funds grow in the first place, however, other than through the means to which I have just referred?

The question I would love to know the answer to, although I think I know the answer, is what has happened since the setting up of the Dormant Accounts Board whereby the funds flowed into the hands of the State as opposed to previously flowing into the hands of the lending institutions. What has happened that has changed that inflow in the period since the board was set up? The Minister of State might make some comment on that in her reply, which would be very interesting.

Reference was made to the NTMA. With the passage of time we tend to become critical of bodies and boards, for one reason or another. The NTMA has a very difficult job to do and it has done a fairly good job. It got the job of managing and trying to wrestle with the debt that arose in the 1970s, which is still hanging around our necks and has not been paid off yet. What happened in the meantime is that growth and inflation caught up and the amount diminished as a proportion of GDP. Of course, we had the more recent ground shuddering events which saw the explosion of the Celtic tiger. We now know that increased management of funds will be required in respect of which the greatest degree of expertise ever known will be required in order to manoeuvre our way through the obstacle course that lies ahead of us.

A point that needs to be made in passing, and reference has been made to it in the course of this debate, concerns NAMA. There are many criticisms of NAMA, with some of which I agree. However, we need to know also that NAMA and everything that goes with it is owned by the taxpayer. When NAMA was set up - I was in the House on the night of the debate - its purpose was ultimately to achieve the best possible result for the taxpayer in the disposal of its assets at a later stage. While it is laudable for people to say we should dispose of as much as we can through local communities for their enjoyment, and this would be some recompense for hardship and so on, that is not what is was set up for. It was set up in order to address the incredible plunge in terms of financial and banking services and the property sector, in particular to address the diminishing value of collateral that was held by the banks or lending institutions. It is easy to understand why some suggest some of the funds should be allocated to various deserving groups, but that is not why the fund was created. The duty of the State is to maximise its value and dispose of whatever it can in whatever way it can to secure recompense for the taxpayer who, ultimately, must pay for all of this. The day when some things were free is long gone; there are no free lunches anymore.

It is no harm to reflect on these matters. The dormant accounts fund concept was good in the sense that instead of the proceeds filtering into financial institutions which were the custodians before the introduction of the legislation and the establishment of the board, it was deemed preferable that the funds flow to the State. This is because, at least, the State has some responsibility to look after the citizenry, to whom it has a duty of care.

The McCarthy report suggested €1.7 million could be saved by the transfer of the functions of the board to the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government. This may be the case, but it brings to mind that awful word "administration". Administration nowadays is more circuitous, long-winded and expensive than it was 25 or 30 years ago, although the opposite should be the case. In the days before computerisation there was a direct system, under which, in so far as possible, administration was curtailed to maximise the impact and ensure the minimum of interference and red tape. Unfortunately, nowadays the reverse is the case. While I welcome the reduced costs of administration of the fund as a result of the proposed change, I have serious doubts about the way society is progressing, with particular reference to the cost of various administrations. I wish to illustrate this point. The simplest of application forms a citizen must use to apply for anything may run to 20 pages. Boxes must be ticked which are then scanned by computers. Consequently, the forms must be filled in a particular fashion. I imagine the Acting Chairman and the Minister of State have had similar experiences. What was the person who created the form thinking when he or she couched certain questions in a given way? This is especially the case if the same question is asked again two or ten pages later. It is as if he or she does not believe the answer from the citizen in filling in the application form. The idea appears to be to ask the same question again and if the same answer is given, the authority presumes it is the truth, but, if it is not, it assumes the citizen is lying either in the first or second instance. My comments relate simply to the cost of administration which has gone through the ceiling and it is not totally the result of cost of living increases. Costs have escalated because administration has become more circuitous and detailed, to the extent that in some cases the details are irrelevant and make no difference. God be with the days when one could use a simple application form to do a simple job and achieve simple results for one quarter of the cost. Let us remember that every document to be filed or filled in requires another person to examine it who sometimes must examine it twice.

The Acting Chairman and the Minister of State will be familiar with the following example of administration costs at their worst. Let us consider the case of a person applying for a local authority house. He or she must fill in an application form and state he or she did not have a house previously. He or she must write to the Revenue Commissioners to get proof of this. Revenue will stamp the form and return it to him or her, perhaps three weeks later, by which time he or she will wonder why he or she had to fill in the form in the first place. It will then lie dormant in the household for several months until the public representative writes to the local authority to explain that the applicant has heard nothing and ask for an update. It will then emerge that the form and the certification from the Revenue Commissioners were not forwarded because had elapsed.

Let us suppose a person applying for a given service or facility is divorced or separated and had previously, either jointly or individually, taken out a mortgage, in respect of which he or she had claimed mortgage interest relief from the Revenue Commissioners. The Revenue Commissioners, correctly, cannot approve such a form. However, the applicant is obliged to send it to them in order that they can reply indicating that they cannot approve such an application because the person had previously claimed income tax relief on a mortgage. Is it necessary to go to these extremes to prove a point? These are simply two examples of the way administration costs have gone mad.

I hope the proposed figure of €1.7 million can be saved as part of the proposal, but I am unsure. We must wait and see. I sincerely hope whatever good uses to which the funds have been put will be mirrored in the future to the benefit of taxpayers and the citizenry, which is as it should be.

There should be designation of disadvantaged areas, which is good. However, I am somewhat concerned about the concept of ring-fencing programmes funded by the taxpayer or which fall under the authority of the taxpayer. There is a problem if a programme has been specifically designed to be implemented in one direction only. This becomes administratively costly and the general good of the community is not necessarily always met as intended.

I am still in a quandary and have no doubt the Acting Chairman is in the same position. I cannot understand why the funds are diminishing. For example, if there were 20,000 dormant accounts in a 20 year period between 1960 and 1980, how could the number diminish in the period between 1980 and 2000? This will remain a mystery. Like all things, however, I must accept that certain matters remain a mystery until such time as someone decides to enlighten me. Perhaps the Minister of State will be good enough to take me out of my agony, to some extent at least, if not to the extent I desire.

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