Fisheries body to be recalled by Public Accounts Committee over protected disclosure report

Résumé détaillé

The Dáil Public Accounts Committee (PAC) takes “extremely seriously” a report finding that a former chief executive of a State fishing agency was offered settlement terms to leave…

The Dáil Public Accounts Committee (PAC) takes “extremely seriously” a report finding that a former chief executive of a State fishing agency was offered settlement terms to leave the organisation which would have required him to drop protected disclosures containing allegations against politicians, its chairman has said.

John Brady of Sinn Féin said the committee would seek the board and management of Inland Fisheries Ireland (IFI) to give evidence before it again on foot of an independent report on a protected disclosure.

The report was considered in private session by the committee on Thursday.

The Irish Times reported on Thursday that the report by KPMG, commissioned by the Department of the Environment, suggests there were two different versions of the severance terms.

One was provided to the former chief executive Francis O’Donnell by IFI, while the other was sent by the agency to the department, its parent body.

The KPMG report upheld, in part, one allegation of wrongdoing made by O’Donnell in a protected disclosure to the department in May 2025. This allegation maintained there had been a request by IFI that O’Donnell “discharge the protected disclosures in lieu of a financial package and a reference”. No settlement agreement was subsequently reached.

At a previous hearing of the PAC last March, Brady questioned IFI chair Tom Collins over whether at any stage the former CEO had been asked to withdraw protected disclosures he had made.

Brady asked whether a condition had been attached at any stage, as part of a proposed settlement agreement or severance agreement, that protected disclosures would be withdrawn.

Collins said: “From memory, no. I will say this. Any discussion we had was towards full and final settlement.”

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