Ruairí Quinn
Question:1 Mr. Quinn asked the Taoiseach the cost to date of legal advice secured outside the Attorney General's office; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13399/98]
Ceisteanna — Questions. - Legal Advice Costs.
Outside legal advice is sought as a matter of routine by the Office of the Attorney General, including the Office of the Chief State Solicitor. This would include seeking opinions and engaging counsel to act on behalf of the State. The provision in the 1998 Estimates for these offices for fees to counsel and for general law expenses amounts to £5.55 million. Expenditure under this heading to date amounts to £2 million approximately. This figure encompasses a variety of legal services and it is not possible to isolate amounts paid for advice only.
Does the Taoiseach, as a former Minister for Finance, agree that expenditure on that scale in any other Government activity would require a tendering process once it exceeded a certain cost threshold? Successive Governments, including my own, have facilitated this practice. Does the Taoiseach consider it wise to allow the Attorney General, members of the Bar and solicitors to decide what the cost of legal advice should be? Should the process of competition not be used as it is in other matters? Certain kinds of legal expertise should be open to competitive tendering and the Taoiseach should make a statement on the matter.
I accept this is substantial expenditure. Government Ministers have to allow tenders for very small amounts of money and have difficulties in half-yearly reviews with trying to take amounts from £50,000 to £100,000 out of subheads. The Office of the Attorney General is covered by Vote 13, and general law expenses amount to approximately £300,000, which is not that much. In this particular period it is mainly the swimming inquiry figures that arise. The fees for counsel amount to £3.45 million which is a more substantial amount of money. There are also general law expenses. In practice the Attorney General allocates these to counsel who look after particular areas on an ongoing basis. There may be a case for examining cases that involve larger fees. In terms of the offices of the Attorney General and the Chief State Solicitor, there is a question of getting the right specialist to do the job, and that is the reason for higher fees. However, I would not be against raising the matter with the Minister for Finance and the Attorney General. The fees are substantial and there is no reason to believe they will not grow in the years ahead. If a better way of ensuring best value for money by some form of tendering can be found, I will certainly consider the matter.
The current practice, which successive Governments have operated, is for the Attorney General, who is a member of the Bar and may very well be a practising member, to decide who should be asked to take a particular brief and, if it goes to court, a judge decides the costs. The three pillars of that triangle all come from within the same industry. They effectively agree prices among themselves and the interests of the consumer or the taxpayer are in no way reflected. Would the Taoiseach not agree that were this the practice in other areas of economic and commercial activity there would be a request under competition law for it to be reviewed? Am I to understand from the Taoiseach's reply that he is prepared to look at this process from the point of view of best practice in every sense of the word, quality of advice as well as cost to the taxpayer?
I am prepared to look at this issue. During the current Dáil the Department of
Finance was directly involved in sanctioning rates. Where that is possible, that is what is done in regard to larger fees. In other cases where there is a defence by the State, there are standard procedures for the payment of fees. Deputy Quinn is stating that they have been in existence for a long time and should be looked at. I have no difficulty in looking at them. In many cases dealt with by the Office of the Chief State Solicitor and that of the Attorney General the problem is in obtaining certain people for certain cases. There is not the same latitude to go to tender as there is in regard to other public procedures. However, if we know there will be substantial fees in a particular case which is upcoming, it would be worth looking at it from the point of view of best value for money, taking competence as well as cost into account.
Questions Nos. 2 to 7, inclusive, have been postponed.