Results 7,321-7,340 of 21,149 for speaker:Mary Lou McDonald

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Okay. I want to make this point, if I might be so bold; the university has taken a battering-----

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: -----and its reputation is critically compromised. The institute stands accused of bullying, of marginalisation, of victimisation, of malpractice and of misleading this committee. Professor Fitzgerald stated that his colleague, Mr. Field, gave incomplete evidence. That is not what he did. Mr. Field deliberately misled the committee. I am in a position to say this because, as it happens, I...

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Please do.

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Okay. I appreciate all of that concern but time is limited.

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Has Mr. Foy been disciplined for any of these matters?

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Why not?

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: "University of Limerick whistleblowers reach two years under suspension", is the headline of an article dated 12 June 2017, written by Ms Anne Sheridan and appearing in the Limerick Leader. Just to let the Chairman know, he is quoted in this matter. It strikes me that there is a world of a difference in the experience of the two whistleblowers, the two women who came forward and whose...

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Okay, we will take that as read. What about Mr. Foy?

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Has the fact that he misled the Department been put to Mr. Foy? Is there an official procedure under way? This, obviously, is a disciplinary matter, is it not?

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: The RTE programme was aired. This and other matters have been aired in the public domain. Professor Fitzgerald is in charge. He has a duty of care for the staff, the students and the reputation and standing of the institutions. Is Professor Fitzgerald seriously telling me that Mr. Foy toddled into work the following day or the following week and nobody pulled him and asked, "Tommy, what...

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Is Professor Fitzgerald trying to tell me that it has taken this length of time to find the paperwork concerned with this specific incident of where the Department was misled?

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Maybe the Department of Education and Skills can help Professor Fitzgerald. Can the Department briefly confirm the report that was carried on RTE that the Department was misled in respect of these individuals?

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Can we have copies of that correspondence?

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: That would be helpful. I do not know whether is it possible to do it in the course of this morning. I have made the point. I am most unhappy with that. It is not that I want Mr. Foy's rights to be trampled upon. I accept he is as entitled to due process as anybody else but I am shocked, and the contrast could not be more stark. These women are two years into their suspension.

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: The other matter of-----

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Can I, just for the record, make it clear that I am not proposing that we use the treatment of those whistleblowers as any kind of benchmark to be visited on anyone else? That is entirely not my point. Professor Fitzgerald knows the point I am making. When staff, particularly in very senior positions, are found - it is not a question of a mistake or messing up - to have deliberately misled...

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Okay. I understand, in Mr. McCarthy's position, it would be so. For the Comptroller and Auditor General to state that the office did not have complete information is, in and of itself, a very significant statement. Is Mr. McCarthy in a position to tell us who, either by name or position, left him with the incomplete information?

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: Fair enough. Let me make this point. Suffice to say the Comptroller and Auditor General was not communicating with somebody who had just come in on a lowly lecturing teaching post.

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: The Comptroller and Auditor General is in communication with the trusted senior levels of management in the college-----

Public Accounts Committee: University College Cork and University of Limerick: Financial Statements (22 Jun 2017)

Mary Lou McDonald: -----who left him with incomplete information.