Results 321-340 of 3,444 for speaker:Shane Cassells

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (22 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: I am trying to explore the processes involved. Perhaps the fact that the objective was achieved covers over a litany of processes that were not good. Is that a fair assessment?

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (22 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: Having read the report and analysed it, what does Mr. Long think constitute normal processes? He has said some of them were not normal, Therefore, with hindsight, could he say the objective was achieved, despite the fact that the processes involved were not what they should have been?

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (22 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: That depends on what one believes is acceptable to get to the end. Not everything in life that has a successful outcome is legally or ethically proper.

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (22 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: There seems to be a sense that the successful outcome masks a litany of failures in the processes used. In the second round of questions to him the Comptroller and Auditor General referred to the processes used.

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: I thank Mr. Daly and Mr. McDonagh for attending and for circulating substantial documentation to us this morning for further reading. The session began with statements focusing on the processes, the commercial decisions and probable losses. Deputy Mary Lou McDonald referred to the differences between the versions of events offered by Martin McGuinness and Peter Robinson. She credited...

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: I meant any Taoiseach, not just the current one.

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: In a note, Tom Rice, the European legal counsel at PIMCO, stated it did not want to continue in a process with any degree of impropriety for PIMCO or NAMA and that PIMCO was willing to withdraw completely. At this point, Ronnie Hanna asked whether PIMCO had considered other options and when Tom Rice asked to which options he was referring, Ronnie Hanna asked if it could be shaped differently...

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: It was not that the board was encouraging them to stay in the process.

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: The Comptroller and Auditor General said nothing other than setting out the implications of both options available to NAMA. Does Mr. McDonagh accept that?

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: Point 4 of your report talks about the reliance on the 5.5% rate and states that the rationale of the report's position was not sustainable. Does that statement in itself not call into question this whole process? Does it mean there are no other questions to be asked at all on the process? Does it not oversimplify what is at play? Ten minutes ago, you stated that you acknowledged there...

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: This is just one example.

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: In one line NAMA states that the rationale for the report's position was not sustainable but there is a lot more to this than the rate, as we have seen in all the hours of discussion here. The answers which have emanated from the questions this committee has asked have led to other avenues of discussion and other requests for information, with witnesses coming in from a whole sphere of...

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: Maybe I am asking the question in the wrong way. Would Mr. McDonagh accept that there is much more to this narrative than the discount rate?

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: Mr. McDonagh said NAMA was not leaving easy money on the table and that other potential bidders would have spotted the chance for an easy killing. The Comptroller and Auditor General said the PIMCO bid for the top 55 assets was £59 above the NAMA net disposal figure.

Public Accounts Committee: Special Report No. 94 of the Comptroller and Auditor General: National Asset Management Agency Sale of Project Eagle (Resumed) (24 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: Mr. McDonagh referred to the board's decision of June 2013 and the question of whether to take into account the board's caveat on other facts, such as risk assessment, or arbitrarily decide to ignore it. Can he talk a little more about that?

Written Answers — Department of Public Expenditure and Reform: Flood Relief Schemes Applications (29 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: 405. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform if the local authority or the private householder has responsibility for completing the application form for the minor flood mitigation works and coastal protection scheme, and attaching a detailed design of the proposed remedial works along with a costing for the proposed work, and for ensuring the remedial works they commission...

Written Answers — Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht: Record of Protected Structures (29 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: 462. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if protection will be provided to a heritage feature (details supplied) in the Laimbe area of the Rath Cairn Gaeltacht, County Meath; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [37171/16]

Questions on Proposed Legislation (30 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: Bertie Ahern brought peace to this country. The Deputy might remember that.

Questions on Proposed Legislation (30 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: We are talking about a former Taoiseach.

Topical Issue Debate: Rail Network (30 Nov 2016)

Shane Cassells: I thank the Minister for his presence in the Chamber and his engagement on this critical matter of the completion of the second phase of the rail line from Pace to Navan. I also welcome members of the business community from Navan and Athboy who are in the public Gallery viewing proceedings. I sincerely hope to have a positive engagement with the Minister on this issue given his firm...