Union training fund used to pay for foreign trips

THE HSE will today hand over further documentation to SIPTU on the controversial €2.35 million training fund the union repeatedly insists it did not receive.

While sources in the health body said it is “highly implausible” that the higher echelons of the union did not know about the €250,000-per-annum payments over a period of eight years, SIPTU said it has the external accounts to prove its ignorance.

The account, part of an overall €60m SKILL programme, was set up eight years ago to “support SIPTU human resources personnel development schemes and the development of union-management partnerships of best practice”.