Results 13,741-13,760 of 28,162 for speaker:Catherine Murphy
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: If the correspondence is circulated, it will end up in the media and there will not be discussion here about it.
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: I know that.
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: On what page is the Chairman?
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: REITs were recently described as the gift that keeps on giving. While I accept this is a policy area, we will return to this issue in time and ask if the REITs were value for money. Rather than seeing it in hindsight, we can see forward with 20:20 vision. If one could make that prediction now, we would say the REITs are clearly not value for money. It is extremely frustrating that we can...
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: Some of us did not vote. It was 5 a.m.-----
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: -----and we got it at 10 p.m. The criticism was that there was inadequate time for scrutiny before the Bill passed all Stages. In fact, the very point that was made was that we were missing things in the Bill by virtue of the fact that we did not have the time to scrutinise it properly and we were advised that it had to be adopted before the markets opened in the morning. It is very easy...
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: -----assets that are disposed of by NAMA. It was an enormous amount of money. The Minister is certainly not going to accede to a committee of inspection - I see the point - but there remains a deficiency in the oversight.
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: Obviously, this will come up in the context of the Department of Finance, which is audited by the Comptroller and Auditor General, but what would have been the difference between the Comptroller and Auditor General auditing this and auditing NAMA or being embedded in the same way? Would there have been a difference? Was the Office of the Attorney General even consulted?
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: As is NAMA.
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: However, there would be assets in IBRC that would be sold for less than their original valuation.
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: My understanding is that IBRC, as liquidated, is required to sell to the highest bidder. That had not been the case, as demonstrated in the pre-liquidated entity. That is why we are having a commission of investigation.
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: Would this normally have been obvious in the accounts?
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: The other issue that was raised was that 800 employees are on zero-hour contracts. Many of them are tutors. It is quite shocking that there is such precarious employment. Would that become obvious in a set of accounts?
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: There are some very curious things if one compares one year with another. There may be good explanations. For example, there is a large amount of money for London but it does not look like that was purchased. We could usefully put this on our work programme for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade to maybe get some proper explanations-----
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: -----as to why there are such variations.
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: Yes.
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: We all have a view on An Bord Pleanála, for different reasons.
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: Sometimes we are delighted with its decisions and sometimes we cannot understand how its decisions are made. Things have changed somewhat with regard to An Bord Pleanála's finances since it was given a slightly different role in strategic planning applications. There is probably a larger amount of money involved now. It would not strike me as an organisation that is screaming out to...
- Public Accounts Committee: Business of Committee (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: I understand that. I am probably making my point very badly. The Comptroller and Auditor General's reports throw up anomalies and things that really need to be interrogated. That is where the first call is. Sometimes, there are very big amounts of money that probably do not get the same level of scrutiny as relatively big amounts of money that are small by comparison. I am more inclined...
- Public Accounts Committee: Houses of the Oireachtas Commission Appropriation Account 2018 (11 Jul 2019)
Catherine Murphy: I have to declare a conflict of interest because I am a member of the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission, but most of the questions I wanted to ask have been asked, which removes the issue to some degree. I will be leaving in about ten minutes, so excuse me if it appears that I am walking out, but I will be here for the answers. I refer to page 17, note 2.5, which concerns prepayments....