DUP advisers knew about how the RHI scheme could be abused but "didn't tell" civil servants, says Dr Andrew McCormick.

He thinks that "changes the perspective radically" and "changes the balance of blame" away from civil servants to some extent.

But there's a "lot of shame" for Stormont officials to deal with too, he admits.

He says many within industry were also clearly aware of how the scheme could be manipulated and he commends those who tried to inform officials.

He says he's happy to "draw back" on the economy department's original claim to the inquiry that there had been a "conspiracy of silence" from industry about the flaws in the RHI.

But there's "still evidence" of "too many who knew and did not tell".

Simon Hamilton was "not the easiest minister to please" at Stormont and "called quite a few things shoddy", says Dr Andrew McCormick.

He tells the inquiry that the economy department's original plan to slash the cost of the RHI scheme in October 2016 was not "as bad as he makes out".

Image source, Press Eye

The former DUP minister Mr Hamilton told the inquiry on Tuesday that part of the plan was "significantly wrong-headed and also dangerous".

And he described how his "heart sank a little" when he realised the proposals were drawn up by the same officials who had been running the initiative when it "had gone off the rails" in 2015.

A DUP adviser anonymously sent documents to Dr Andrew McCormick that revealed two DETI civil servants had given industry figures advance notice of the addition of cost controls for the RHI scheme.

The adviser was John Robinson (below), the aide to the then economy minister Simon Hamilton - Dr Andrew McCormick was the top civil servant in their department and they worked closely with him.

Image source, Pacemaker

There was a sense of astonishment from the inquiry panel on Tuesday when Mr Hamilton said the documents were sent with his full knowledge and the panel couldn't understand why the adviser would send the papers anonymously.

Mr Hamilton admitted it was "not my proudest moment".

Dr McCormick says the action was "self-evidently astonishing" and there there "wasn't even enough postage on the envelope".

The documents were also leaked to journalists.

The "reality" that civil servants had "got used to" since devolution returned at Stormont in 2007 was that ministerial advisers "were in charge", says Dr Andrew McCormick.

He didn't feel - even as a senior civil servant responsible for the RHI scheme - that he could ask to see emails between DUP advisers about the delay in implementing cost controls in the initiative.

Image source, Reuters

He says the DUP was "in crisis mode" in December 2016 as it came under fire about its advisers' involvement in the scheme.

"It was was the most extraordinarily messy two weeks I've ever went through by some distance."

An email to Dr Andrew Crawford from a prominent Northern Ireland hotelier is the "single heaviest document" the inquiry has obtained to prove that the DUP adviser was aware of how the RHI scheme could be abused, says Dr Andrew McCormick.

Howard Hastings' energy adviser was told that there were allegations that the RHI was being abused and that the subsidies on offer were to be cut.

The hotelier forwarded that to Dr Crawford, saying that it "surely" wasn't happening on the DUP adviser's watch.

The Hastings Hotels group owns the Europa Hotel (above) in Belfast, the Slieve Donard in Newcastle, County Down, and various others.

Dr McCormick says the email "conveys direct reference to the abuse of the scheme... which proves Andrew Crawford was aware of that abuse" in summer 2015 when the cost controls plan was being worked on.

Arlene Foster's DUP adviser said "we could fill our boots" with money from the RHI scheme because he believed it was coming from the Treasury rather than from Northern Ireland's own budget, claims Dr Andrew McCormick.

Dr Andrew Crawford worked with Mrs Foster during much of her time as a Stormont minister, including when she was in charge of the RHI scheme.

He made the "fill our boots" remark to Dr McCormick at a dinner in October 2016, according to the senior civil servant.

Dr McCormick outlines several times when it was inferred to him that Dr Crawford had been involved in the delay in getting cost controls added to the RHI.

Another DUP adviser told Dr McCormick that "others in the party" didn't want cost controls and the "inference" was that he meant Dr Crawford, he claims.

In January 2016, Dr McCormick publicly identified Dr Crawford as the adviser who exerted influence to keep the scheme open - the DUP aide resigned as a ministerial adviser shortly after that but denied the claim.

Dr Andrew McCormick denies overstepping the line of political impartiality when he was trying to establish facts about DUP involvement in the handling of the RHI scheme.

He undertook some investigative work in his economy department for documents the DUP wanted to present as laying out the facts of the fiasco ahead of the party leader Arlene Foster's interview about it with the BBC's Stephen Nolan in December 2016.

He also took part in actions that led to the release of an email to Arlene Foster by the so-called whistleblower Janette O'Hagan, in which she tried to flag up the key RHI flaw to the then enterprise minister in 2013.

Image source, Reuters

Dr McCormick explains the tightrope a civil servant has to tread as he understands it.

"It's impossible ultimately to separate working for the benefit... for the government as a whole from things that are advantageous to a party," he says.

"It was in the public interest, in the general interest that candour was deployed - that's what was motivating me, not trying to help the DUP."

Dr Andrew McCormick says his "level of anxiety and fear went up several notches" when he discovered he'd been secretly taped by former enterprise minister Jonathan Bell in December 2016.

Mr Bell (below) recorded discussions with his former top civil servant shortly before he went public with his allegations about the actions of DUP advisers in relation to the RHI scheme.

He'd been the minister in change of the scheme during the period that it did the most damage to the public purse.

He met Dr McCormick to view documents from his time at the department and recorded the conversation to get a "contemporaneous, accurate account" of what was said.

Image source, Pacemaker

Dr McCormick says he was "shocked by the thought" of having been recorded - he hadn't been concentrating on what he was telling Mr Bell because it seemed like a "very informal conversation".

When he found out about the tapes and Mr Bell's intention to go public with them, his thought was: "Had I said something outrageous or derogatory in an unguarded moment?"

During the discussion, Dr McCormick expressed surprise at a suggestion that the senior DUP adviser Timothy Johnston had been the instigator of the delay in adding cost controls to the scheme the previous year, although he later said in the same conversation Mr Johnston had been involved.

He says now he's never had any knowledge of a personal role by Mr Johnston in the RHI in summer 2015.

The RHI Inquiry has just published evidence it's received from the DUP MP Ian Paisley.

He recalls a meeting with Jonathan Bell, the former enterprise minister, in December 2016 - here's a flavour of what he has to say about that...

You can read Mr Paisley's statement in full here, external.

A handful of other new statements have been published too - you can find them here, external.

Dr Andrew McCormick ordered a fact-finding investigation at Stormont's economy department to establish what had gone wrong in its running of the RHI scheme for it to have turned into such a disaster.

He acknowledges that it was a "narrow" investigation at first because he wanted to "get to the bottom" of some "basic" points "quickly".

At the time the Northern Ireland Assembly's Public Accounts Committee (PAC) was carrying out its own inquiry in the wake of the Northern Ireland Audit Office's savage report about the handling of the scheme.

Dr McCormick says he wanted his internal investigation to "stay ahead" of the PAC's process, which he thought could turn out to be "disorderly".

"I wanted to establish a fair, proper process that would avoid any risk of a kangaroo court."

A plan to inspect biomass boilers registered on the RHI scheme was ordered in the dying days of the Northern Ireland Assembly in January 2017 but it's had limited success.

The aim was for every boiler to be examined but the latest report from the civil service team dealing with the RHI shows that just 190 installations have been inspected out of a total of more than 2,000.

Dr Andrew McCormick says the inspection scheme is "now going as well as possible in the circumstances".

There were problems with the procurement of an inspection provider, he explains.

One of the key civil service figures in the RHI debacle, Dr Andrew McCormick was the top civil servant at DETI when big problems with the scheme emerged and through until after its emergency closure.

He had to clear up much of the mess that was created in the department by the political fallout over the scheme in late-2016 and early-2017.

He has since switched roles and now has just as big a task on his hands as he deals with all things Brexit as Stormont's director general of international relations.

His witness statement to the inquiry makes for a dramatic read and you can find it in three parts here, external, here, external and here, external.

He appeared before the inquiry twice last month, saying that he didn't "recall any resistance" from DUP advisers to the RHI scheme being placed on the agenda during ministerial meetings.

On his most recent appearance a couple of weeks ago he said there was an "extremely leaky system" with confidential information at Stormont.

Quick fact - his PhD was in isotope geochemistry.

He's been in the inquiry hotseat in the Senate chamber a fair few times so far but Dr Andrew McCormick can rest assured that this is definitely the last time!

Image source, RHI Inquiry

He was the top civil servant at DETI, which set up and ran the RHI scheme, and had a front-row seat when the burn-to-earn initiative was crashing and burning.

Inquiry counsel David Soffield QC is asking the questions this morning and he'll be focusing on the period from mid-2016 through until the efforts to slash the cost of the RHI in the early part of 2017.

Sir Patrick Coghlin pays tribute to the "forensic skills and powers of analysis" of the inquiry's legal team and the support they've received from research and admin staff.

"For that we are extremely grateful," he says on his panel's behalf.

Image source, RHI Inqiry

There's also a thanks for the staff at Parliament Buildings for accommodating the inquiry and to the Hansard team at Stormont for their tireless work in making the "absolutely invaluable" transcripts of the proceedings.

And there's a tip of the hat to the media for its coverage of the inquiry, which he says has been "clear, objective and accurate and I'm very grateful for that".

Opening the final day's proceedings, inquiry chair Sir Patrick Coghlin has a couple of announcements to make.

He reveals that while no more evidence will be taken in public hearings, some witnesses can expect to receive more questions in writing given some of what's emerged in recent weeks.

Image source, RHI Inquiry

The inquiry was due to return for a couple of days in December to hear closing statements from some of the core participants - that will be extended to a third day.

Those closing statements will be heard on Wednesday 12, Thursday 14 and Friday 15 December.

BBC News NI

The head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service apologised for "multiple failings" by Stormont officials in their handling of the RHI scheme.

David Sterling offered a "profound and unequivocal" apology for what happened and promised that lessons would be learned to prevent it from ever happening again.

But the inquiry chair Sir Patrick Coghlin said the civil service had a lot of convincing to do given that two previous major projects had also been botched as a result of similar flaws.

BBC News NI

An independent inquiry into the RHI scandal was established in January last year by the then finance minister Máirtín Ó Muilleoir.

He ordered it in the wake of the huge public concern and what was then a major political crisis surrounding the scheme.

The RHI Inquiry began in November last year and Sir Patrick Coghlin (below), a retired Court of Appeal judge, is its chair and has been given full control over how it operates.

Image source, Pacemaker

It is looking at:

• the design and introduction of the RHI scheme
• the scheme's initial operation, administration, promotion and supervision
• the introduction of revised subsidies and a usage cap for new scheme claimants in autumn 2015
• the scheme's closure in February 2016

For more information on the RHI Inquiry, you can read our handy Q&A.

When the scale of the overspend emerged, public and political concern rocketed.

As the minister in charge of the Stormont department that set up the RHI scheme, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) leader Arlene Foster faced calls to resign from her role as Northern Ireland's first minister in December 2016.

Image source, PA

She resisted and Sinn Féin's Martin McGuinness then quit as deputy first minister in protest at the DUP's handling of what had by then become a full-blown political crisis.

That move brought about the collapse of the Northern Ireland Executive. Now, well beyond a year-and-a-half on from that, Northern Ireland remains without a devolved administration.

You can find much more detail on the RHI scheme in our need-to-know guide.

The budget of the RHI scheme ran out of control because of critical flaws in the way the initiative was set up.

Claimants could effectively earn more money the more fuel they burned because the subsidies on offer for renewable fuels were far greater than the cost of the fuels themselves.

At one point the estimate for the overspend was set at £700m if permanent cost controls weren't introduced - temporary cuts have since pulled the budget back on track for now.

Whatever the scale of the bill, it will have to be picked up by the Northern Ireland taxpayer.