Kilkenny Fianna Fail Deputy John McGuinness has pledged to thoroughly investigate the recent discovery of a €3.6billion euro ‘double count’ which saw a payment between State agencies being counted twice.
As Public Accounts Committee chairman, John McGuinness has said he will be immediately seeking to hold a special meeting of the committee arising out of the serious accounting error confirmed by the Department of Finance today.
Deputy McGuinness said: “In the first instance the people need to know how this occurred, when it was discovered and how it was brought into the public domain. The impact on the country's debt to GDP ratio, namely that it would be 2.3 per cent lower as a result of the error being rectified, is very significant.
“I will be seeking to commence an investigation into this immediately with a view to establishing who was responsible for the error and should be held to account.
“To that end I have asked the Clerk of the Public Accounts Committee to seek a report from each party, the Department of Finance and the NTMA. When this information is received, as I expect it will be in short order, this issue will be raised immediately with the appropriate accounting officers in each body before the Committee.
“The Public Accounts Committee must be able to get to the bottom of this and report on this matter to the Dáil,” he concluded.
Meanwhile, Minister for Finance Michael Noonan told the Dail the mistake in the national accounts of €3.6bn was "human error" on behalf of an official in the Department of Finance.
Mr Noonan said it was clear there had been a systems failure and said it was a very serious issue.
“The Secretary General of the Department of Finance have been asked to conduct a review into the matter and the CSO has already informed Eurostat of the double count and the EU and IMF have also been informed,” he added.
It’s expected that the correction will reduce the national debt by 2.3 per cent but will not have any impact on next month's Budget.
