Results 10,361-10,380 of 34,618 for speaker:Seán Fleming

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: It is probably right to ask the Accounting Officer to send us a note on all of these different organisations and capital loan schemes in the context of the amounts outstanding, capital advance leasing facilities and so on. Will Mr. John McCarthy provide an indication of the throughput, the value of money and where the debt rests? Is it with the Housing Finance Agency? I ask for a pen...

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: Which agency?

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: Mr. John McCarthy has just told me that the Housing Finance Agency will lend to approved housing bodies. As such, why does it not just deal directly and cut out the middle man?

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: It is a bank with no front of office.

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: It sounds to me as if there should be just one organisation.

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: In the note to the committee, Mr. John McCarthy should provide the pen picture on all of those different schemes. He should also outline the justification for why there are two agencies in the same corner dealing with the same loans to the same housing agencies.

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: This is for my benefit. I will always ask a question if I do not know the answer. If I do not know the difference between one and the other, I take it that others also do not. As such, I do not mind asking. The Comptroller and Auditor General stated earlier that the Department is committed to tidying up the register of approved housing bodies prior to the introduction of the statutory...

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: How many agencies were cut and what were the starting and ending numbers?

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: Of the 500, 50 carry out 90% of the business. Is the target to get them down to 100 or is there any target at all?

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: The Department is committed to an exercise of tidying up but it has no target as to what it wants to achieve.

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: Was that not done the last time?

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: Some have been approved since but never did anything. When was that?

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: In other words, the Department did a tidying-up exercise a few years ago and it is telling us that it is very difficult to get on the register now. Only one or two are approved each year. However, it is now saying that some may have come on in the past few years, having got charity approval and proved their bona fides, but they have never done anything. Based on the one or two approved per...

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: Does the Department have a timeline for that tidying up exercise?

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: Is it on the list for this Dáil term?

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: That is something. The Comptroller and Auditor General also stated that the Housing Agency acts as an intermediary to purchase targeted suitable residential properties from banks, investors and owners. For whom does it act as an intermediary?

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: These are perhaps vacant properties where the banks have entered into possession.

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: What commission does the agency get for doing all of this for the banks?

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: Some fool - the organisation; I do not mean an individual. Mr. O'Connor is saying that the agency is acting as the banks' selling agent and auctioneer and finding people to buy properties. It is getting blue-chip purchasers who have no problem with mortgage approval. Nobody else would do that for the banks for nothing. I ask Mr. O'Connor to go away and think about that. The agency should...

Public Accounts Committee: 2017 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Chapter 10 - Funding and Oversight of Approved Housing Bodies
Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government
2017 Financial Statements - Housing Agency (25 Oct 2018)

Seán Fleming: Thanks.