Government pays €690k in rent for family mediation centres

RENT paid by the Government for premises to run 16 family mediation centres cost €690,123 last year, up by more than €70,000 on 2008.

Despite calls for administrative cutbacks in the Family Support Agency, which runs the service, following the McCarthy report last year, the Irish Examiner has learnt that the headquarters of the family mediation service still costs €42,915 to rent per quarter. The premises, based on the first floor of St Stephen’s Green House, is rented from the Office of Public Works at an annual cost of €171,660.

At another OPW building in Cork, rent jumped from less than €3,000 a quarter in 2008 to more than €5,000 last year.