I welcome the opportunity to present the requirement for Further Revised Estimates 2025 for the Department of the Taoiseach and the Office of the Chief State Solicitor, following on from the Taoiseach attending the Joint and Select Committees on Finance, Public Expenditure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, and Taoiseach on the 2025 Revised Estimates for the Vote group on 9 July this year. The key function of the Department of the Taoiseach is to support the Taoiseach and the Government, including in implementing the programme for Government, through principled leadership and joined-up governance by: providing impartial high-quality policy advice in the national interest; co-ordinating Government activity to ensure effective, inclusive and timely decision-making; upholding democratic integrity, Civil Service values and public trust at the centre of government; and promoting a strategic and sustainable long-term perspective that safeguards Ireland’s future prosperity, cohesion and resilience. The 2025 gross Revised Estimate for the Department of the Taoiseach is €38.2 million. A total of 67%, or €25.42 million, of the allocation relates to salaries, wages and allowances. Administration costs for the Department account for 16%. The remaining 17% provides non-pay funding for the National Economic and Social Development Office, the Covid-19 evaluation, citizens' assemblies and independent tribunals of inquiry and commissions of investigation. A Supplementary Estimate of €3.389 million is requested for Vote 2 - Department of the Taoiseach. The need for the Supplementary Estimate relates to reimbursement to the National Treasury Management Agency, NTMA, in respect of third-party costs relating to the Moriarty tribunal of inquiry and the National Asset Management Agency, NAMA, commission of investigation. Funding provision for tribunals of inquiry and commissions of investigation was discussed with the Department of Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation as part of the 2025 Estimates process. Given that substantial allocations that had been made under these subheads in previous years went unspent, the 2025 allocation for tribunals of inquiry and commissions of investigation was agreed on the basis that any additional third-party costs falling due would be funded by way of a Supplementary Estimate. The resolution to establish the Moriarty tribunal of inquiry was passed by the Oireachtas on 26 September 1997. The tribunal cost falls within the remit of Department of the Taoiseach. However, the tribunal is fully independent of the Department. The Department has no control over the amount or timing of third-party costs. Following completion and publication of the Moriarty tribunal’s final report in 2011, a number of significant legal challenges resulted in considerable delays to the completion of the process regarding applications for third-party costs. The legal costs unit of the State Claims Agency has delegated sanction under the National Treasury Management Agency (Amendment) Act 2000 to assess bills of costs when received. Settlements are processed and paid by the legal costs unit and reimbursement is then sought by the NTMA from the Department of the Taoiseach. A total Revised Estimate of €3.31 million was provided for tribunals of inquiry in 2025. It is estimated that reimbursement to the NTMA in respect of third-party costs relating to the Moriarty tribunal of inquiry will amount to approximately €6.785 million in 2025, resulting in a funding requirement of €3.475 million. The NAMA commission of investigation was established in June 2017, following extensive consultation with Oireachtas Members, to investigate the sale by NAMA of its Northern Ireland portfolio, known as Project Eagle. The Taoiseach was the specified Minister under the Commissions of Investigation Act 2004. The commission submitted its final report in April 2025, which dealt with the legal costs payable to the witnesses who appeared before it. All commissions of investigation over the years covered by this subhead were independent and the Department of the Taoiseach had no control over their investigations or the third-party costs the commission would direct the Taoiseach to pay. The 2025 Revised Estimate allocation under subhead A5, commissions of investigation, is €2 million. It is estimated that reimbursements to the NTMA in respect of third-party costs related to the NAMA commission will amount to €2.764 million in 2025, giving rise to a Supplementary Estimate requirement of €764,000 in subhead A5. The total additional funding requirement in respect of third-party costs related to the Moriarty tribunal and the NAMA commission of investigation is €4.239 million. However, the Department has identified savings of €850,000 to offset this additional funding requirement. Therefore, a Supplementary Estimate of €3.389 million is required for Vote 2 - Department of the Taoiseach. This will bring the 2025 gross Further Revised Estimate for the Department of the Taoiseach for the full year to €41.569 million. I will turn now to the request for a technical Supplementary Estimate for the Office of the Chief State Solicitor, CSSO. While the Taoiseach and other officeholders in the Department of the Taoiseach have certain responsibilities to the Oireachtas for administrative matters in the CSSO, the office operates independently of the Department of the Taoiseach. The CSSO is seeking to reallocate funding so that savings on budget lines can be used to offset increased expenditure under a number of subheads. The CSSO is a constituent part of the Attorney General's office and acts as solicitor to Ireland, the Attorney General and Departments and offices. The CSSO's mission is to provide the highest standard of professional legal services to the Government, Departments and offices as economically and efficiently as possible and to support adherence to the rule of law. The overall level of counsel fees is entirely demand-led and they are only paid following a robust, multilayered process which assesses each fee note individually to ascertain the correct fee payable for the work involved. The overall level of case fee notes is entirely demand-led and depends not only on the number of cases but also on the complexity of such cases in a given year. The technical Supplementary Estimate is requested to allocate funding of €1.264 million to cover additional expenditure under four subheads in the CSSO Vote: subhead A2, administration non-pay; subhead A3, external legal services; subhead A4, fees to counsel; and subhead A5, general law expenses. Subhead A2, administration non-pay, was allocated a provision of €4.464 million in the 2025 Revised Estimates. An additional €232,000 is sought under this subhead. Inflationary increases, combined with delayed receipt of certain invoices at the end of 2024 now falling due in 2025, gave rise to the increased expenditure under this subhead. An additional allocation of €62,000 is required to cover projected total spend of €312,000 on external legal services in 2025. This subhead provides for costs associated with engaging local State solicitors to act on behalf of the CSSO in the Circuit Courts and occasionally in the District Courts outside of Dublin. This increased expenditure arose due to an increase in the level of case activity in the work handled by local State solicitors, which varies from time to time. An allocation of €17 million was made under subhead A4 in respect of fees for counsel in 2025. However, the current position shows that after the fees requested by counsel undergo a value-for-money assessment, it is estimated total fees to counsel in 2025 will be €17.801 million, leaving a shortfall of €801,000 in this subhead. These are primarily fees payable to external counsel following the delivery of the relevant legal service, where they represent Departments and offices in litigation before the Irish courts, other tribunals and the Court of Justice of the European Union. The overall level of these fees is, to a large extent, demand-led and dependent on the level of activity in the courts at any time and on the complexity of the given cases. It is therefore difficult to forecast the level of fees each year. A provision of €630,000 was made in the 2025 CSSO Revised Estimates for general law expenses, which are demand-led and depend on the types of cases being taken by and against the State. It is estimated that expenditure on general law expenses will be approximately €800,000 in 2025, which gives rise to a requirement for an additional allocation of €170,000 under this subhead. The CSSO has identified savings under subhead A1, administration pay and excess appropriations-in-aid, which will offset the total estimated €1.264 million expenditure shortfall in Vote 6. To allow the Oireachtas to vote on the technical Supplementary Estimate, an additional €1,000 must be requested on the CSSO's 2025 Revised Estimate, bringing the 2025 gross Further Revised Estimate for the CSSO to €54.55 million. I commend the motion to the House.
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Does the Deputy want to discuss the Estimates?
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I thank the Deputies for their contributions on the Supplementary Estimates for Votes 2 and 6, and for setting aside the time for this motion, given the time-sensitive nature of the Supplementary Estimates process. I will just clear up a few points. Last Thursday afternoon, in my diary, I was to attend the finance committee on behalf of the Taoiseach in relation to these Supplementary Estimates. At approximately 12 noon on Thursday, after our Business Committee meeting, I was informed that I was no longer required to attend by the committee. Those are the facts.
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Excuse me, this is not questions and answers.
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Excuse me, this is not questions and answers.
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A Chathaoirligh, please chair the meeting.
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Please chair the meeting.
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Go raibh maith agat, a Chathaoirligh. The arrangement was made with my private secretary and the clerk of the committee. I am only speaking the facts.
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I was told-----
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The Deputy might get away with shouting at people all of his life, but I am here to answer.
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No, I am not.
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This is not a point of order, a Chathaoirligh.
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A Chathaoirligh, please chair the meeting. This is not a point of order. I know the rules of this House.
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If they want me to answer I will answer, or they can talk down the clock, whichever they require.
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I have heard what Deputy Doherty has said. He can try to undermine me all he likes, saying that he does not want a junior Minister standing opposite him. I am the Government Chief Whip at the Department of the Taoiseach. I am also Minister of State at the Department of Health with responsibility for mental health and I attend Cabinet. I am well qualified to stand here. Deputy Doherty might not recognise that sitting in opposition but I am proud of what I am and who I have become as Chief Whip of this Government. That is the first point. The second point, which none of the Deputies opposite wants to acknowledge, is that this is time sensitive and this Vote has to happen by 3 December, next week. It is my job to make sure the Votes are taken. It is too easy to comment that the Taoiseach will not come and present here. He simply did not have the time to come before the committee.
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There is precedent for this, as I said today on the Order of Business. I have been ten years in this House and for ten years, I have done Estimates, including four years as Chair of the Oireachtas Committee on Business, Enterprise and Innovation from 2016 to 2020. I have done Supplementary Estimates for the past six years, including last Wednesday in relation to health. I know what Estimates are and I know how they work. I also know there is precedent for the Chief Whip to take Estimates. It has happened before. I repeat that in 2004 the Minister of State, Mary Hanafin, attended select committee; Deputy Jack Chambers, who was Minister of State at the time, took Director of Public Prosecutions Supplementary Estimates on 30 November 2022; and on Thursday, 23 November 2023, the Chief Whip, Deputy Naughton, took the DPP Supplementary Estimates and a technical Supplementary Estimate for the Department because the Taoiseach was not available. The whole purpose of the meeting here today-----
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No, those are just three examples I came with. I can find more if the Deputy likes. I have no problem looking back on things. The most important thing we should be here discussing are the Estimates, and many of the Deputies opposite chose not to discuss them.
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The situation is very clear. The Supplementary Estimate for Vote 6 is purely technical in nature. The CSSO does not require additional funding in 2025; it just needs the permission of the House to move funding within its Vote. The Supplementary Estimate for Vote 2 is substantive but unavoidable. It arises solely due to the payment of additional third party costs related to the Moriarty tribunal of inquiry and the National Asset Management Agency commission of investigation. I must stress again - it does not matter how many times I say it - that the Moriarty tribunal of inquiry and the NAMA commission of investigation are fully independent of the Department of the Taoiseach, and the Department has no role in determining the amount or timing of any third party costs.
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I must also stress that when finalising the 2025 Revised Estimate for the Department of the Taoiseach, the Department of Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation agreed that any additional third party cost falling due in 2025 would be funded by way of a Supplementary Estimate. It is important to note that the Department of the Taoiseach is otherwise within budget for 2025 and has managed to identify savings of €850,000 within its Vote to offset some of the additional third party costs that have arisen in 2025. My preference was to attend at committee, not to be here on the floor of the Dáil, to set out the case for the Supplementary Estimates for Votes 2 and 6, and I had set time aside last Thursday.
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I regret that this did not prove possible. In particular, as I said, there is precedent for the Chief Whip-----
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-----presenting requirements for Supplementary Estimates for Votes in the Vote group of the Department of the Taoiseach.
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Go raibh maith agat, a Chathaoirligh.
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Shall I respond?
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Shall I respond?
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As regards the Moriarty tribunal, established in 1997, the spend to date is €77.948 million. I would have been quite happy to answer any questions if I was afforded the time to do so but the Deputies opposite chose not to do so. They chose to attack me and the Taoiseach.
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I am sure all the paperwork has been circulated.
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I was not aware that they had not got the briefs. I would have assumed-----
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Yes, because it is time sensitive. I was prepared to go in last Thursday afternoon and I was informed-----
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No, I did not. I was prepared to go in last Thursday afternoon and I was told around lunchtime on Thursday that the meeting was no longer going ahead and that the committee did not wish the Chief Whip to attend.
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That is what I was told.
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I was not aware of that during the committee.
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A Chathaoirligh, the debate has concluded.
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The debate has concluded.
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The information that goes to any committee in relation to Estimates will be circulated.
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It was not rushed; it was debated on the floor of the Dáil.
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This is the third time this has been dealt with this way this year - three committees.
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A Chathaoirligh-----
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Correct.
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