Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Question 50: To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children if she will report on each and all of the meetings which have taken place between her immediate predecessor and the then Secretary General of her Department; if her attention has been drawn to the nature of the discussions as alleged in a recent Sunday newspaper article just prior to her appointment as Minister; if she has been briefed on the nature of these discussions; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [9490/05]

Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)
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I regret to inform the Deputy that I cannot report on each and every meeting held between my predecessor as Minister for Health and Children and the Secretary General of my Department. Such meetings would be too numerous to recount and report on, and I have not asked to be briefed on them. It is not uncommon for Secretaries General to talk to previous Ministers in their Department.

I understand that the meeting referred to took place on Monday, 13 December 2004 at the request of the Secretary General who was in the course of preparing a report to me on the issue of public long stay charges for consideration by the Government the next morning. I was briefed about the conversation at this meeting on the following Wednesday.

The terms of reference for the report by Mr. Travers focused on events between 1976 and October 2004, when I sought legal advice from the Attorney General on the public long stay charges. Mr. Travers's report sets out the information which he judged to be relevant to, and within, the terms of reference. I was not party to interviewees' conversations with Mr. Travers other than my own. I cannot say what he was told apart from the information contained in his report.