PPARS firms ‘avoided tax’

FINE Gael leader Enda Kenny yesterday contended up to five companies recruited to work on the PPARS payroll system for the health services may have been involved in facilitating tax avoidance.

Mr Kenny was responding to reports in a Sunday newspaper that claimed that four other companies besides the Guernsey-based Blackmore Group Assets Limited may have facilitated tax avoidance through offshore companies.

He said that the internal audit of the Health Service Executive (HSE) into the awarding of PPARS contracts in 2002 must now be completed and published as a matter of urgency.

These questions need to be addressed along with the central issue of how the payroll and personnel system has ended up costing almost €200 million to date, he said.

"I would also like to see a wider inquiry by the Revenue Commissioners into IT related contracts awarded by the HSE/Health Boards in recent years," said Mr Kenny.

He said that the chief executive officer of the HSE, Professor Brendan Drumm, accepted at a Public Accounts Committee meeting last Thursday that no tax clearance certificate had been obtained for Blackmore, a British Virgin Island company, which is administered from Guernsey.

"How many other IT contractors have not been fully checked out?" he asked.

"In relation to Blackmore I have written to the Tánaiste Mary Harney asking her to establish urgently who the beneficial owner is. I believe it is important that we establish this fact."