Results 7,221-7,240 of 7,412 for speaker:Neasa Hourigan

Public Accounts Committee: 2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 11 - Office of Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform
Vote 12 – Superannuation and Retired Allowances
Chapter 3 - Vote Accounting and Budget Management
Chapter 4 - Accounting for Capital Assets
Chapter 5 - Accounting for Allied Services (22 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: Chapter 4 of the 2018 annual report of the Comptroller and Auditor General, in respect of accounting for capital assets, stated that the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform accepts different valuation methodologies by different Departments in respect of capital assets. That includes when and how often to conduct valuations, how to value those assets in the context of methodology and...

Public Accounts Committee: 2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 11 - Office of Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform
Vote 12 – Superannuation and Retired Allowances
Chapter 3 - Vote Accounting and Budget Management
Chapter 4 - Accounting for Capital Assets
Chapter 5 - Accounting for Allied Services (22 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: Is Mr. Watt happy that the Department's advice and the move to regularise valuation is being implemented by various Government bodies and Departments? NAMA appeared before this committee a couple of weeks ago and there were issues with valuation not being done in the right way. Is Mr. Watt happy that this is being implemented and that there are sufficient skills in Departments to implement...

Public Accounts Committee: 2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 11 - Office of Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform
Vote 12 – Superannuation and Retired Allowances
Chapter 3 - Vote Accounting and Budget Management
Chapter 4 - Accounting for Capital Assets
Chapter 5 - Accounting for Allied Services (22 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: I want to get one question in.

Public Accounts Committee: 2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 11 - Office of Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform
Vote 12 – Superannuation and Retired Allowances
Chapter 3 - Vote Accounting and Budget Management
Chapter 4 - Accounting for Capital Assets
Chapter 5 - Accounting for Allied Services (22 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: I want to get one more question in but I agree with Mr. Watt that it is a fairly substantial change and worth doing. As a new Deputy, I am trying to get a handle on the relationship between the Estimates and the accounts and how that works within the Dáil and within Departments. It has been raised in a number of reports I have read in the past few months and highlighted by the OECD...

Public Accounts Committee: 2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 11 - Office of Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform
Vote 12 – Superannuation and Retired Allowances
Chapter 3 - Vote Accounting and Budget Management
Chapter 4 - Accounting for Capital Assets
Chapter 5 - Accounting for Allied Services (22 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: What should be the role of sectoral committees? At the moment, they merely note Estimates.

Public Accounts Committee: 2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 11 - Office of Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform
Vote 12 – Superannuation and Retired Allowances
Chapter 3 - Vote Accounting and Budget Management
Chapter 4 - Accounting for Capital Assets
Chapter 5 - Accounting for Allied Services (22 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: The parliamentary standard in other EU states is that sectoral committees have a more engaged role in examining Estimates and then returning afterwards to look at accounts. That does not seem to happen in the Irish context.

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: I thank the witnesses for coming in this afternoon. I will try to make my questions as succinct as possible in order to get through as much as we can. I will begin with the numbers in the accounts that relate to the rental of temporary school accommodation. I am sure everyone in the room could name a long list of schools in his or her area that have some sort of long-term temporary...

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: The spend is increasing. Has the Department undertaken a comparative analysis between that use of funds and reducing the time it takes to build capital projects?

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: I am aware of those issues.

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: I have a question that relates specifically to the provision of those kinds of services. The accounts refer to expenditure of €29.5 million. How is that figure distributed between suppliers of units such as prefabs? What percentage of that spend goes to the top three suppliers? I assume there is a competitive process. I do not think I need to ask about that. Who are the top three...

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: We will come back to the properties and buildings. I have a separate question about them. How many suppliers does the Department use for prefab units? Is there a competitive process?

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: I thank Mr. Loftus. Returning to rental accommodation, we are all aware of the prefabs issue. Children throughout the country are sitting in prefabs that are older and not fit for purpose. There are also schools like Gaelscoil Choláiste Mhuire across the river from us in Parnell Square that have been in rental buildings for years. I considered this school for my own child. It is...

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: That is not really relevant to a discussion of buildings that have been rented for a very long time. Gaelscoil Choláiste Mhuire has been in that accommodation for decades.

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: What is the longest-standing rental agreement for temporary accommodation that is currently in place?

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: A note on subhead A15 states "A supplementary of €8 million current expenditure was approved for this subhead to provide for additional temporary school accommodation costs". If the figure for spending on rented accommodation was €26.2 million in 2018 and €29.5 million in 2019, can the officials clarify where the €8 million supplement fits?

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: I thank Mr. Ó Foghlú. I will move on to the schools remediation programme. We are mostly talking about Western Building Systems here. What have the remediation costs been so far, and how much higher does the Department expect them to run?

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: I have been involved in construction projects with the Department before. Has the Department looked back on that process to ensure that it does not happen again?

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: I am going to move on to overpayments and paper payslips. In 2018 and 2019, approximately 45,000 people were in receipt of approximately €5 million in overpayments. What is the value of overpayments that has been written off by the Department? Why do these overpayments persist? Are controls in place to prevent such issues happening? What has the Department done to prevent a...

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: So right now, does everybody get a payslip?

Public Accounts Committee: 2018 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
2019 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 26 - Department of Education and Skills (21 Oct 2020)

Neasa Hourigan: Is that every two weeks?