Results 15,481-15,500 of 26,766 for speaker:David Cullinane

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: Mr. McCarthy has been reporting failures, lapses or weaknesses in the board's control for four years.

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: In his opening comments today he said, "The statement on internal control sets out the steps being taken by the Board to resolve the control weaknesses identified" for 2018. Is that correct?

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: Were similar statements on internal control set out for 2014, 2015 or 2016?

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: I will deal with the examples in front of me, namely, those included in the opening statement. Mr. McCarthy has categorised them into three areas. He states, "evidence was not available in respect of 56% of the sample cases examined that required pricing quotations were received by the Board in advance of grant payment", "evidence was not available in respect of around 50% of the sample...

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: In the statements of control set out by Caranua, were the steps it would take to deal with those weaknesses identified?

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: I will now come to Mr. O'Callaghan, who is the chair of the board. When will Caranua be winding up?

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: Mr. O'Callaghan still has to be held to account because the board has a responsibility to ensure that when weaknesses are identified, they are resolved and addressed. It is not good enough that year after year we have to deal with issues of compliance with public procurement rules and failures of bodies to present accounts. If a body is receiving taxpayers' money and, having carried out his...

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: It is not criticism; it is a fact. I am not dealing with personal opinions here.

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: I am dealing with facts. The committee deals with factual statements and audited accounts from the Comptroller and Auditor General, not the opinion of myself, Mr. O'Callaghan, or anybody else. The facts are that, over four years, Mr. McCarthy and his team set out failures. Mr. O'Callaghan's organisation said it would remedy them, but it failed to do so. Why did it fail to remedy those...

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: I must interrupt Mr. O'Callaghan. I will not allow him to use the survivors as an excuse for the organisation and the board failing in their responsibilities. The survivors have nothing to do with it. There is-----

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: The survivors have nothing to do with failures of controls in Mr. O'Callaghan's organisation. He should not suggest that the survivors or their needs are the reason his board failed in its duty to correct the weaknesses the Comptroller and Auditor General outlined every year. At the start of this response, Mr. O'Callaghan stated that the weaknesses lay in the way in which the organisation...

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: Is Mr. McCarthy of the same view?

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: It must have been very high. If the percentages for this period were 56%, 50% and 55%, they must have been very high previously.

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: The percentages were similar. I am trying to understand why the organisation did not deal with those lapses in controls. That is what we are here to discuss. We are here to ask these questions.

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: I will go back to Mr. McCarthy because I am not satisfied with this response at all. It is completely disingenuous to respond that no money was misplaced. Nobody is suggesting that money was misplaced.

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: I am sorry, but no. I will return to Mr. McCarthy. His job is to make sure that processes are robust, that money paid out is properly accounted for, and that the processes stand up to scrutiny so that he can say that money spent was spent for the purposes for which it was intended. In these areas, he is saying that the processes were not robust enough for him to say definitively what...

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: He is not saying that money was not spent properly.

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: Is Ms Downes saying that the Comptroller and Auditor General was unfair because he was not taking into account-----

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: -----that the survivors were not able to comply with the guidelines that are in place? Is that what she is saying?

Public Accounts Committee: Caranua Financial Statements 2017 (17 Oct 2019)

David Cullinane: I have no problem whatsoever in accepting that we are dealing with very difficult circumstances here, with individuals who were victims of institutional abuse.