Thomas Byrne (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

It does and, in that context, I am not querying what the Clerk did in respect of this matter. I am, however, querying what the Minister did in order to satisfy the strict legal requirements with which the Clerk must comply. It is important that the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht come before the House in order to explain the recent appointment to the board of the IMMA. The latter is an extremely important institution within the State and its reputation has been brought into disrepute as a result of what happened in this instance.

Very little information has been made available in respect of this issue. However, details relating to it leaked into the public domain in the past couple of days. The appointment in question was made approximately one week ago. I presume that the person who was appointed will be elected to the House and will be obliged to resign from the board of the IMMA at that stage. That would be an outrageous abuse of the process relating to ministerial appointments. I take this opportunity to second the amendment to the Order of Business put forward by Senator Darragh O'Brien and I wish to propose my own amendment to the effect that the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, Deputy Heather Humphreys, come before the House in order that she might explain exactly what occurred in connection with the appointment to which I refer.