Colleges spend €750k on taxis in two years

EDUCATION Minister Ruairi Quinn has been urged to take action if universities are found to be wasting public money after it emerged they spent more than €750,000 on taxis in the last two years.

Almost €263,000 — or 35% — of the €753,446 in taxi charges paid by the seven colleges in 2010 and 2011 was racked up at University College Cork (UCC). The university also paid over €533,000 in expenses associated with visiting lecturers in 2009 and 2010, but the number of people involved is not revealed.

Just over €17,000 was paid by NUI Galway (NUIG) for around 300 visiting lecturers in the same two years, while Dublin City University (DCU) paid €50,000 for 97 visiting lecturers in 2009 and 73 in 2010. The only other university to provide visiting lecturer costs was University of Limerick, which said it paid an hourly rate only for 1,029 people across both years.