Results 10,181-10,200 of 28,162 for speaker:Catherine Murphy

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: When somebody makes an application for these funds, how project-ready do they have to be before they make it through the process? If there are time lags, that may well be a reason. Has any review shown up anything hinting at deficiencies in spending money on very worthwhile projects?

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: It is difficult not to feel that this is a scheme that no Department really wanted. It has been transferred a few times. If one applied to a Department for funding for a road or a school, one has to go through a process before the project makes it into a budget for the year. This does not appear to meet that criterion. It is very loose, and yet, it is not as if there is a lack of...

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: Presumably, the expectation would be that the money would be used within, say, the three-year window.

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: What changes would Mr. McCarthy propose that would make the scheme more flexible and yet allow the money to be spent appropriately?

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: How many people does the Department have dedicated to monitoring and reviewing this? How is it being reviewed? Is it being reviewed within the Department? Can Mr. McCarthy talk me through that very briefly?

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: What kind of time and what kind of numbers of people are going to-----

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: I refer to people dedicated to this.

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: It is a matter of the outcomes, really. If the work is going to be almost exclusively on, for example, carrying out the review, as opposed to ensuring that the projects are up and running and the money is appropriately spent, to what does the Department give priority?

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: I want to go through one or two items to flesh the matter out a little. In the Department of Justice and Equality the largest underspend occurred in 2015 on the Garda youth diversion project, which is a very worthwhile programme within the Garda. For this project there was an allocation of just under €500 million - sorry, it was €500,000. I wish it were €500 million....

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: Yes, please do.

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: The Department got the money and then had the dialogue.

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: Does Mr. Ó Briain have a piece of advice as to how this should change?

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: Is the underspend addressed now-----

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: Does Mr. Ó Briain think that will be fully spent?

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: Yes, I was going to say that.

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: Does the Department make assumptions now that those projects are up and running and that they will continue to be funded from the same source?

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: A total of €200,000 was allocated for awareness raising of domestic and sexual violence and €70,000 was drawn down.

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: The report was to be laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas in 2015. Why was that not done?

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: I may come back to flesh out the individual ones with the underspend.

Public Accounts Committee: 2016 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General
Chapter 7 - Dormant Accounts Fund (8 Feb 2018)

Catherine Murphy: The witnesses made a statement earlier that a scheme may never have got off the ground and never reached the level of activity or uptake envisaged. I think that goes to the heart of the matter. This is not designed for the kind of uptake and profile of how things happen at community level. My understanding is that it is so cumbersome to apply for that there are people and organisations...