I welcome everyone to today's meeting of the Committee of Public Accounts. We received apologies from Deputy Boland this morning. Before we proceed, I have a few housekeeping matters to go through. Members are reminded of the provisions in Standing Order 226 that the committee shall refrain from inquiring into the merits of a policy or policies of the Government or a Minister of the Government, or the merits of the objectives of such policies. Members are also reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice that they should not comment on, criticise or make charges against a person outside the Houses or an official either by name or in such a way as to make him or her identifiable.

I remind members of the constitutional requirement that in order to participate in public meetings, members must be physically present within the confines of the Leinster House complex. Members of the committee attending remotely must do so from within the precincts of Leinster House.

The agenda for today is to discuss the minutes, accounts and statements, correspondence and upcoming meetings, and we will then suspend and begin the engagement with officials from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, at 10.30 a.m. The minutes of the meeting of 29 January 2026 were agreed by the committee and these will be published on the committee's website. Regarding accounts and financial statements, there were three sets of accounts and financial statements laid between 26 and 30 January 2026, which are due to be considered today.

We are joined by the Comptroller and Auditor General, Mr. Seamus McCarthy, who is a permanent witness to the committee. I ask him to now address these before opening the floor to members.

First, we have the financial statements of the Health and Safety Authority for 2024. It received a clear audit opinion. No. 2 is the financial statements of the Road Safety Authority for 2024, which received a clear audit opinion. However, I drew attention to two matters. First, note 20 provides detail of steps taken to maintain the financial stability of the Road Safety Authority following operational deficits in 2024 and 2023. This included the provision of exceptional supplementary funding of €7.5 million in 2024. The second matter I drew attention to was the statement of internal control discloses a material level of procurement non-compliance. The figure in that case was €7.48 million.

The third set of financial statements relate to the Credit Union Restructuring Board. The accounts are for 2024 and it received a clear audit opinion.

I thank Mr. McCarthy for that. Do members wish to comment on any of those?

Regarding the Road Safety Authority, did the whole issue around driving licences and testing feature much in the accounts, in terms of its ability to respond to lengthy waiting lists and so on?

It would not feature in the accounts. Obviously, the fees paid for driver testing are a significant income source, but on the other side, there is an expense associated with providing the driving test. It would be more in the annual report where I imagine it gives an account of delays and so on. I do not audit the annual report itself but certainly, there is some detail in the report on that.

It would just always say it is recruiting additional driving testers and so on. I thought there might be a significant increase in expenditure.

You can see the turnover of expenditure in the year is about €105 million and from memory, I do not think there is a huge increase in the expenditure level but certainly, it is under cost pressures and it indicated that one of the responses was an increase in the fee levels for the various services from 1 January 2025.

We will see when the 2025 financial statements are presented if it has stabilised its financial position. Obviously, that reflects in the service it is able to provide.

Do members agree to note the listing of accounts and financial statements? Agreed.

The committee has received the following B items of correspondence. These are items of correspondence from Departments and public bodies. No. R-2026-0044 is correspondence received from Ms Elaine Gunn, Clerk of the Dáil, regarding the Oireachtas expert working group, dated 29 January 2026. Do members wish to make a comment on that correspondence? No. I note it was agreed in our private session that as part of the process, as regards reviewing the broadcasting services going forward, there is a public consultation process. It is agreed the committee will submit correspondence and a submission before the deadline, which is 20 February. As it is an issue we have discussed extensively, we will compile that submission, circulate it to members and get agreement on it. The thrust of that submission will be a recommendation that it becomes a service fully and solely operated from within the Civil Service, as opposed to an outside broadcasting provider. Is it agreed to note and publish but redact some items of this correspondence? Agreed. Do members wish to discuss any other items of correspondence? No.

Moving onto the work programme next week, on 12 February the committee will meet the National Children's Science Centre. Following discussions earlier and in previous weeks, the following additional meetings have been agreed. On 19 February, we will have the Department of Justice, Home Affairs and Migration; on 26 February, it will be the Department of Education and Youth; on 5 March, it will be the Department of Social Protection, the Office of the Revenue Commissioners and the Department Enterprise, Tourism and Employment; and on 19 March, we are looking at doing a piece of work in terms of the climate adaptation programme. The Comptroller and Auditor General has done a chapter on this whole area in terms of flood forecasting. I do not know whether Mr. McCarthy wishes to make a comment on it at this stage.

It was a chapter included in the 2023 report on the accounts of the public services. It related to climate change adaptation of the overall response to flood risk. It is quite detailed and there is a strategy that has been in place since 2019, which includes over 20 actions that would provide for a comprehensive response to the impacts of climate change on flood risk.

One of those is an ambition to progress the establishment of the national flood forecasting and flood warning service, which is provided for in the Vote for housing. However, in recent years, I have noted the money provided has not actually been spent. It may be something the committee is interested in following up on.

We had a discussion on this in our private session. Given the seriousness of the floods, which many areas within the State have experienced in recent weeks, and the ongoing poor weather forecasts and orange weather warnings, this is an area the Comptroller and Auditor General has done extensive work on. There is a chapter there and it is timely that we look at that, particularly the piece of work around flood forecasting and the warning service. Millions have been allocated on an annual basis with considerable amounts of money being handed back unspent annually, yet we do not have this flood forecasting or warning service in place. We are going to look at including that and bringing in the OPW and the Department of housing, as well as Met Éireann, to have a look at this. We are going to look at that on 19 March and we will check the availability of witnesses.

On 26 March, we have the Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment and Inland Fisheries Ireland. On 16 April, we will have the Department of Education and Youth and on 23 April, we are looking at bringing in several hospitals on the whole issue of insourcing. Once that is finalised, we will have further detail on that. Are there any other items which members wish to raise at this point under any other business? No.

That concludes this session. We will now suspend the meeting until 10.30 a.m.