Results 6,701-6,720 of 7,777 for speaker:Joe Costello

Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: That is fine. The delegates are due to attend in March anyway.

Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: I will comment on that. We have had a fairly thorough response from Mr. Waters on the new prison project proposed for Thornton Hall. Clearly, a very large amount of money - over €50 million - was spent on the project, which never went ahead. The reason for the project in the first place was that the Department had come to the conclusion that it could not provide in-cell...

Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: It has been clearly pointed out that, irrespective of the basis for the initiative, it was not progressed effectively to any stage over a ten-year period. All that was provided was road access, resulting in extra expenditure. The total expenditure is probably a lot more than €50 million. It is incredible, bearing in mind the purpose for which the site was purchased in the first...

Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: The Chairman does it pretty well. I ask the Comptroller and Auditor General for his views.

Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: In the meantime, would it not be possible for the committee to write back to Mr. Waters to point out the contradictions in the activities that the Department has engaged in, and the total lack of justification for the expenditure of taxpayers' money?

Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: At the end of the report there is an indication that they will be producing a report in the summer, so presumably they are doing some research or background examination on the issue.

Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: Good.

Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: We can herd them in the room together.

Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: It would be use of the €200,000 per acre.

Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: I support what Deputy McDonald has proposed. It is a major scandal that over €3 billion in the accounts of over 350 Irish citizens would be in a bank of this nature, which is very questionable in the manner in which it operates. A similar situation has transpired in Britain, where over 1,000 British citizens were in the same situation. HM Revenue and Customs have collected...

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
IDA Ireland - Financial Statement 2013
Enterprise Ireland - Financial Statement 2013 (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: I compliment both organisations on their record results in 2014. They made a huge contribution to the overall well-being of the State in recent years when we were in deep recession. If it were not for the activities of the IDA and Enterprise Ireland, with regard to exports and bringing in new companies and investments it would have been far more difficult for us to have survived an...

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
IDA Ireland - Financial Statement 2013
Enterprise Ireland - Financial Statement 2013 (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: With proper co-location one person could be in an office where other services are provided by the IDA, the ESB or Fáilte Ireland, so that Enterprise Ireland would not have to establish an office per se.

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
IDA Ireland - Financial Statement 2013
Enterprise Ireland - Financial Statement 2013 (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: It is always very valuable to have a presence on the ground, rather than, for example, servicing Africa from Madrid or Turkey from Italy. In such cases one is not on the ground to actually know what is going on in a real fashion. Perhaps opportunities have been lost which could have been dealt with if there had been a full sharing of facilities.

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
IDA Ireland - Financial Statement 2013
Enterprise Ireland - Financial Statement 2013 (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: Would the IDA reply to that question also?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications: Proposed Sale of Aer Lingus: (Resumed) IAG (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: I welcome Mr. Griffin and Mr. Walsh. What Mr. Walsh has to do today and in the coming days is to convince the Government and us to troop into the Dáil and vote to dispose of the 25.1% shareholding. When the privatisation took place in 2006-2007, there was a specific amendment put in place for a particular purpose, that is, to prevent the entire privatisation of Aer Lingus so that we...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications: Proposed Sale of Aer Lingus: (Resumed) IAG (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: Mr. Walsh is the CEO of IAG-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications: Proposed Sale of Aer Lingus: (Resumed) IAG (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: -----but he is also the chairman of NewERA-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications: Proposed Sale of Aer Lingus: (Resumed) IAG (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: -----of the NTMA, which contains the NewERA company which has responsibility for the disposal of State assets. Is there not a certain degree of incompatibility in Mr. Walsh's role in seeking to buy out Aer Lingus in that respect? Third, Mr. Walsh is, I presume, a deferred pensioner. In recent times, the deferred pensioners have very considerable grievances about the manner in which they...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications: Proposed Sale of Aer Lingus: (Resumed) IAG (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: Does Mr. Walsh fully rule out the possibility of the Government retaining its shareholding?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications: Proposed Sale of Aer Lingus: (Resumed) IAG (12 Feb 2015)

Joe Costello: I did not quite catch that. What is Mr. Walsh able to say on the Government's shareholding?