COMMITTEE OF PUBLIC ACCOUNTS debate -
Thursday, 26 Sep 2013

Business of Committee

Chairman

Are the minutes of the meeting of 19 September 2013 agreed? Agreed. Are there any matters arising from the minutes? No. Correspondence 3A.1, dated 24 September 2013, is from Ms Niamh O'Donoghue, Secretary General of the Department of Social Protection, providing additional information requested at our meeting of 18 July, to be noted and published.

Correspondence 3B.1, dated 10 September 2013, is from Mr. Michael Barrett, Lakeside Marina, County Westmeath, to be noted and a copy forwarded to the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government for a note on the issues raised.

Correspondence 3B.2, dated 11 September 2013, is from Mr. Stephen Mulholland, Ballivor, County Meath, regarding Permanent TSB charges, to be noted. This is not a matter for the Committee of Public Accounts. There are appropriate avenues to appeal bank charges and we will inform Mr. Mulholland of this.

Correspondence 3B.3, dated 12 September 2013, is from Mr. Daniel O'Mahony regarding evidence previously given to the committee by the Department of Education and Skills regarding the home tuition scheme, to be noted. The committee has dealt with the issue and Mr. O'Mahony has been advised of the position.

Documents relating to today’s committee meeting are 3C.1, correspondence received 23 September 2013 from the National Asset Management Agency regarding a briefing paper on matters to be considered at today's meeting, to be noted and published, and 3C.2, correspondence received 25 September 2013, also from NAMA, regarding the opening statement at today's meeting, to be noted and published.

I will not read through the list of reports, statements and accounts received since the meeting of 19 September. If members have any issues arising, I ask them to let the clerk know. They are all to be noted with the exception of 4.10, NAMA's annual report and financial statement for 2012, which will be examined at today’s meeting.

The work programme is now on screen. A meeting has been scheduled with Forfás and Ordnance Survey Ireland on 17 October 2013. We will examine Forfás’s accounts at 10 a.m. followed by Ordnance Survey Ireland’s accounts at noon. We may have a private meeting on Thursday, 24 October to consider our report on bank stabilisation. A meeting has been scheduled with Bord na gCon on 7 November 2013. Do members have comments on the work programme? The Comptroller and Auditor General's report will be published next week and from this we will outline our work programme beyond the dates I have mentioned.

Two matters arise under any other business. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has been in contact with the committee about sending a delegation to examine the oversight of expenditure in a programme country. At this early stage we are looking at travelling to Ethiopia, possibly on Thursday, 14 November. The clerk will be in contact with members on this.

The second issue relates to the banking Inquiry. As members may know, the commencement order for the Act which provides for an Oireachtas inquiry was signed by the Minister yesterday. Last year the committee did a lot of work on scoping out the issues which should be addressed in any such inquiry, and these are laid down in our report which was published in July 2012. In this report the committee indicated clearly it is best placed to conduct such an inquiry and this remains the position. Work on the procedural framework which needs to be put in place before permission to undertake an inquiry can be given is under way, but it will be later this year before it is complete. We will probably write to the Committee on Procedure and Privileges, CPP, referring to our recommendations in the report.

Deputy Eoghan Murphy

Is it our understanding the Committee on Public Accounts, those who sat on the sub-committee and the staff who prepared the report will be consulted during the preliminary process?

Chairman

We do not know. The CPP is drawing up the procedural framework for the inquiry and I believe we should send our report to it. I do not believe it will consult us. It will probably set down guidelines.

Deputy Eoghan Murphy

Is it accepted the Committee of Public Accounts will not do this work? Has this been established?

Chairman

No. The Committee of Public Accounts has indicated it wants to conduct a bank inquiry and we have set out, through our report in 2012, how this could be achieved. This remains the case. To inform the CPP, we will forward our report, indicate our interest and indicate how we perceive the inquiry can be carried out. It will then be up to the CPP to decide how to carry it out.

Deputy Eoghan Murphy

Given the extensive and very good work the committee has done, I believe we are best placed to hold the inquiry and I hope the committee is making every effort to do so. I support the Chairman in his efforts.

Chairman

We are making every effort and taking our position from our 2012 report, which states clearly not only our interest but exactly how we feel it could be done. The legislation was enacted yesterday and it is up to the CPP to decide. I understand it will be some time before this happens.

Deputy Derek Nolan

Does the same apply to our request to hold an inquiry into the levy fund? Will this be delayed in the same way?

Chairman

We have waited for the legislation to be enacted because it is on this new legislation we want to act. It was enacted yesterday and we have applied to the CPP for compellability. We had to wait for the Act.

Deputy Derek Nolan

I thought it was because of compellability we sought not to hold an inquiry.

Chairman

It is a different part of the same Act.

Deputy Eoghan Murphy

With regard to the committee's work on NAMA, the Committee of Public Accounts is named in the legislation as the committee to which NAMA is responsible. It is also responsible to the Minister, and much of the Minister's dealings with it will happen behind closed doors, perhaps as they should. The Committee of Public Accounts is the one body which can publicly hold NAMA to account.

The 2012 report will involve a great deal of work for the committee and I wonder whether one session is sufficient or suitable. Perhaps today will prove it is, but when we consider the amount of work we will have with NAMA, how important our oversight role is and how different it is to the role of the Joint Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, we might consider giving more time to it in the future. Over NAMA's ten year span the Committee of Public Accounts will be the only Oireachtas committee with the power and responsibility to hold it to account and ensure it does the job we want it to do for the taxpayer and the State. We would regret it if, in a number of years, we looked back and saw we had not given it enough attention. It last came before the committee in June 2012 to discuss a specific report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and its first appearance before the committee was at the end of 2011. We should try to schedule more regular meetings with NAMA. It will shortly give the Minister its medium-term report for 2013 and this would be an opportunity to bring NAMA before the committee to discuss the report and not only have meetings on the production of an annual report because it contains so much. I do not know to what extent we will be able to discuss the IBRC issue today, given it is not included in the 2012 annual report, but it is a significant issue for NAMA. We could spend five hours discussing 2012 and not speak about the IBRC. This would be a mistake and we will see how it goes.

During particular sessions, the committee has sat for a long time. It is not fair to witnesses or committee staff to sit for five or six hours. We should be aware of that when planning meetings with NAMA. Perhaps we should break a meeting into two sessions on the same day or over two days if we are to ensure we do the job as thoroughly as we want.

Chairman

That is a fair point. Be it NAMA or any other body that appears before us, I will be guided by members if they believe that additional time or meetings - or even a full day meeting - are required. I take the Deputy's point on the number of hours that we sit with witnesses. If he believes that a further session is necessary after today's session - he is right that there is a great deal of detail concerning IBRC, NAMA and so on - I will accommodate a further meeting. I am sure NAMA will respond positively.

Deputy Eoghan Murphy

Can we not wait for NAMA's annual report every year to call on it? We could call on it twice per year and still have a great deal of important work to do.

Chairman

The Deputy stated that NAMA was finalising a report for the Minister.

Deputy Eoghan Murphy

I believe so. It relates to medium-term progress in 2013. It will be mentioned in the opening statement.

Chairman

If the Deputy feels that this meeting does not cover the ground sufficiently, we can have a further meeting on today's business as well as the report.

Deputy Eoghan Murphy

Or we could schedule something for the first quarter of 2014.

Chairman

Yes.

Clerk to the Committee

That might be better, as the IBRC material might have been provided by that stage.

Chairman

That is fine. Is that agreed? Agreed.

Deputy Robert Dowds

I agree with Deputy Murphy. The areas covered by NAMA are so extensive that we will need a great deal of time. It is a much bulkier area than many of the others we address. Given the fact it is of considerable interest to the public and the State, we should focus on it more strongly.

Deputy Derek Nolan

Is the Comptroller and Auditor General's office undertaking an examination of the issues surrounding the liquidation of IBRC, its impact on NAMA and so forth? Will such a decision arise when the office audits next year?

Mr. Seamus McCarthy

The planning for the audit of 2013 is under way. The potential impact of the IBRC resolution is forming a central part of that planning. We are already discussing the issues with NAMA. That has been going on since the middle of this year when the previous audit finished.

Deputy Derek Nolan

It will be in next year's accounts.

Mr. Seamus McCarthy

Yes. The issues will be dealt with in those. I might also point out that, under the National Asset Management Agency Act, I am carrying out an assessment of the extent to which NAMA has made progress in achieving its overall objectives. I will have an additional report on that matter.

When NAMA appeared before the committee last year, Deputy Sean Fleming made the point that the timing was perhaps not ideal in that the annual report had not yet been presented. NAMA produces quarterly reports, which are not complete reports. If the committee has two meetings, the timing and the amount of information that members will have available might dictate whether one will be in late July or possibly early September, as we are doing to examine the annual report, and the other will be at the half-year report.

Deputy Eoghan Murphy

Is the report on NAMA's activities to which the Comptroller and Auditor General referred the first three year report?

Mr. Seamus McCarthy

Yes, the triennial.

Deputy Eoghan Murphy

When is that expected?

Mr. Seamus McCarthy

The analysis and fieldwork have been completed and the report is being drafted. I expect it to be completed in the next couple of months. The idea of a meeting early in the new year would probably fit with that.

Deputy Eoghan Murphy

Perhaps we could schedule around that.

Chairman

Yes. I shall ask the clerk to inform NAMA that that is our intention. Are there other matters arising? Is our agenda for Thursday, 3 October 2013 agreed? We will meet the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. The agenda consists of the 2011 appropriation accounts: Vote 7 - Superannuation Retired Allowances, and Vote 42 - Office of the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform. Is that agreed? Agreed. The 2011 annual report of the Comptroller and Auditor General: chapter 6 - financial commitments under public private partnerships, chapter 12 - Vote accounting, and chapter 13 - procurement without a competitive process, will form part of the meeting.

Sitting suspended at 10.25 a.m. and resumed at 10.26 a.m.