Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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214. To ask the Minister for Finance if officials in his Department have been involved in reviewing the way in which the State Claims Agency handles sensitive cases. [21063/18]

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
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The State Claims Agency (SCA) is part of the National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA), which is a body under the aegis of the Minister for Finance. On this basis, officials in my Department are in regular contact with the SCA regarding my role as the responsible Minister. This contact does not extend to monitoring the SCA’s day-to-day operations, including its handling of sensitive cases, as the SCA is part of the NTMA, which has its own governance structures as established by the Oireachtas under the National Treasury Management Agency Amendment (Amendment) Act 2014. The Board of the NTMA oversees those governance structures and both the Secretaries General of the Departments of Finance and Public Expenditure and Reform are ex-officio members of the Board.

The Secretary General of the Department of Finance and a senior official from the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform also sit on the NTMA Board’s State Claims Agency Strategy Sub-Committee. This Sub-Committee, which has been operational since September 2017, assists the SCA in providing advice on strategic, policy and organisational issues.

While the SCA is a body under my aegis, of necessity, the handling of cases related to a particular Minister’s area of responsibility require close coordination with the Department concerned. On this basis the NTMA (Amendment) Act 2000, under which the SCA was established, provides for the SCA to deal directly with the bodies which are delegated to it for claims management on behalf of the relevant Minister.