Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome what the Minister has said, but there is a significant difference in what she said and what her predecessor said. Will she accept on the record of the House that her predecessor, if he did not mislead the Dáil or give us significantly inaccurate information, certainly did not give us information that was accurate? What could have been understood from what he said on the previous occasion was that the people who resigned did so because they had been advocating this arrangement with the US when the reality was, as the current Minister has correctly said, they were the people who opposed this arrangement. They were the people who caused the then Minister to get advice on the matter from the Attorney General but some of the people who advocated that approach, which the then Minister, Deputy Deenihan, indicated could have cost the National Concert Hall €1.5 million, and which was advised against subsequently by the Attorney General, are still members of the National Concert Hall board. People with a concern about this issue would be concerned lest those people would in the future become members of the statutory board given their history on this matter.

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