OPW wasted millions, says report

A DAMNING report to be launched tomorrow will reveal cost overruns to the tune of millions of euro at the Office of Public Works (OPW).

The latest report from the powerful Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee (PAC) will focus on three areas where purchase and rental agreements entered into by the OPW saw millions go down the drain. Specifically, tomorrow’s report will target expensive cost overruns incurred by the OPW in property deals related to asylum seeker accommodation, office space for the Probation and Welfare Service in Dublin and the refurbishment of Cork’s Courthouse.

Speaking to the Irish Examiner, PAC chairman Michael Noonan said the OPW had paid too much for five substantial properties purchased to house asylum seekers which had never been used.

One such property, the Devereux Hotel in Rosslare, was sold by the OPW for €1.86m - almost €1m less than it had cost.

Another 33-bed hotel in Macroom was purchased for €3.5m in 2000, and despite remaining empty, has so far cost the tax payer €500,000 in security costs.

Deputy Noonan said the PAC report would also be critical of a rental agreement whereby the OPW paid retail rates for office space for the Probation and Welfare Service in Dublin’s Donameade shopping centre. “They were paying retail rates in the shopping centre when they could have gone down the road for far less,” he said.

Instead of paying the normal rental fee of €11.50 per square foot the OPW agreed to pay €20.31 bringing the annual rental bill to a massive €150,000. To make matters worse, fitting out the offices cost €1.5m - 10 times the original OPW estimate - while legal complications meant they remained empty for the first three years.

Deputy Noonan also said the €26.5m Cork Courthouse refurbishment “was a bit of a fiasco and ended up costing far more than it should have.” The scale and projected cost of the courthouse, which opened in February, escalated from an estimated €6.35m while rental costs for alternative accommodation in Camden Quay came to a massive €750,000 a year. Since 1999 fit-out and rent of the much-maligned Camden Quay facility cost more than €6m.