Thomas Pringle (Donegal, Independent) | Oireachtas source

It is interesting the Minister in his response said that all fraud is wrong but in his eyes and those of Fine Gael and the Minister, Deputy Varadkar, all fraud is not wrong, only social welfare fraud is wrong and that is the only fraud that is being actively pursued. When one puts such fraud in context it pales into insignificance compared to white collar crime and white collar fraud that is rampantly in this State. Will the Minister advise us of the way in which staffing levels in the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement have been maintained since 2010 and by how much they have reduced? How many forensic accountants does that office employ who can investigate fraud issues? When we have those figures, that will reveal the real attitude of the Government to tackling fraud.

The Minister said that the first comprehensive increases were in 2017. We could have had far better increases before now if the Government had been tackling white collar crime and the proceeds of that crime had been retained in the Exchequer. NAMAleaks has received many reports of employees of NAMA using NAMA information for personal gain in contravention of the NAMA Act. That is the type of white collar crime to which I am referring. When will the Minister start to investigate that?

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