Results 14,881-14,900 of 26,537 for speaker:John McGuinness

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: We may very well ask in that agency. With respect to broadband, the metropolitan area networks, MANs, was quite an expensive project overall. Have we got value for money out of it and are they all in use? There was a long period when a number of them were not in use and there was no pick-up on them.

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: Where are they?

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: How does it operate? The taxpayer paid for the infrastructure. Is it now rented, leased or taken up privately?

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: Will you provide a note on each of them so we can have an idea of where are the weaker examples and the pick-up on them?

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: When you were here last, I asked about the ESB.

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: I was checking that out. There was a €48 million allocation.

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: That is what it got.

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: The total cost was €48 million. The ESB got a grant of €16 million. It provided fibre-optic equipment wrapped around their high-voltage wires around the country in a figure-of-eight system. Has any individual company or household benefitted from that investment? The ESB was to put in the infrastructure and then there is the issue of the last - or first - mile. I am an ESB...

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: Why was it given €16.6 million?

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: Somebody in the Department at the time must have indicated to the ESB that it would get grant aid of €16.6 million once it provided X, Y and Z. The simple question is whether it provided X, Y and Z. Has an audit been conducted of the spend of the €16.6 million? Has ESB International given audited figures to support the spend of the €16.6 million? Have the set targets...

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: It should be comprehensive. I have been chasing that for a long time.

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: I can remember at the time the press releases would have stated that this was an ingenious way of covering the first or the last mile. I have never seen a letter from the ESB, as it was then, offering a service that showed any pathway to spending that money. I want to know how that €16.6 million was spent. What were the rules of engagement? How much did they actually get? What...

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: With regard to the issuing of petroleum exploration licences, I do not want to get into individual licences. However, I made inquiries about the issuing of a licence in the south east, and tabled a parliamentary question on it. I have had correspondence with the Department. It is extremely difficult to get to the end of the issues that can be confronted by an applicant for such a licence....

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: I do not want to go into the individual case.

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: Is the process efficient, or is it cumbersome and hard to deal with from an applicant's point of view? Or is there such caution on the side of the Department that they have to go through this?

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: I will try to get that information for Mr. Griffin. I had other questions for him, but I will leave those. If Mr. Griffin gives us the information he has been asked for, we can then bring in the IFI to deal with the other outstanding questions more directly. As regards contracts that have been entered into and the lack of a suitable tendering process, how does that happen within the...

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: Who decides to continue such contracts? How is that process dealt with?

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: What is the cost of the rolling contract that is currently in place?

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: What is the second contract?

Public Accounts Committee: 2013 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources
Chapter 8 - Operation of the Emergency Call Answering Service (7 May 2015)

John McGuinness: The national cyber-security centre.