Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It is fair to say that when commissions of investigation were established and that legislation came through the House - I remember it well during my first or second Dáil term - the view at the time was that they would replace tribunals and would be much less costly. They have certainly been less costly but the view was that they would happen more quickly, which has not been the case. Frankly, there is a real difficulty in inquiring into any kind of commercial transaction because there will always be people who will argue that a better result or price might have been secured for something had it been sold to someone else or done sooner or later and that is very difficult to prove. I hope this new stand-alone agency will reduce the need for commissions of investigation, at least in the context of issues of company law. It does beg the question of why, if there was evidence of criminal activity in connection with those matters that are now being considered by the commission of investigation, they were not investigated by the ODCE or the Garda rather than a commission of investigation.

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