Council seeks advice on €400,000 Healy-Rae contracts

KERRY County Council is to seek legal advice after it emerged that one of its members earned over €400,000 in contracts from the council last year.

Cllr Danny Healy-Rae, son of Deputy Jackie Healy-Rae, was the council’s highest-earning plant hire contractor last year.

Councillors voted by eight to six to seek legal advice on whether a conflict of interest exists where a council member connected to a plant hire firm is involved in work for the council.

However, Mr Healy-Rae’s right to win the contracts was strenuously defended before the council and the council’s head of finance, John O’Connor, told the meeting the annual plant hire list was formed following public advertisement inviting quotations. It was council policy always to try to achieve value for money in the hire of plant and equipment, he added.

Mr Healy-Rae was paid €401,283 for his contracting services in 2003, according to figures released by the council. The council paid €5 million to 95 private contractors to carry out works on roads, haulage and other areas last year. The second-highest earner received over €345,000 and another €320,000. Others earned from €200,000 to €100,000, but most were considerably lower.

The figures were requested by Independent Cllr Brendan Cronin. He also asked county manager Martin Nolan if he could give a public guarantee he was legally satisfied there has been no conflict of interest by any member connected to a plant hire firm involved in the council’s roads programme.

Mr Nolan left the meeting at this point with his law agent and a senior official. Danny Healy-Rae also left at that point.

When the manager returned, an official said there was no way the manager could know if a conflict of interest existed, nor was he obliged to do so. Mr Nolan said members themselves were obliged to declare when they had a beneficiary interest in an item being discussed.

Danny Healy Rae’s brother, Michael, who also sits on the council, claimed the matter was inspired by begrudgery and was a “cheap shot”.

He said he hoped more money would come down from Government so that all 95 contractors could grow and employ more people.

“Let the Hi-macs roll, and the lorries roll and let the begrudgers go into the fires of hell. Any insinuations are to be abhorred,” Michael Healy-Rae said.