VEC’s legal spend tops previous 10-year bill

County Cork VEC spent more on legal bills in 2010 than in the previous 10 years combined.

Figures show that for 2010 it reported legal costs of €178,333 to the Department of Education.

The total legal costs it accounted for between 2000 and 2009 were €176,677.

The next highest year was in 2007, when its legal outlay was €55,113. In six of the 10 previous years its annual legal cost was less than €20,000.

The significant spike in 2010 was questioned at yesterday’s monthly meeting of CCVEC but it was not broken down during the public session.

In 2009 an internal audit of procurement at CCVEC noted there were invoices for legal bills worth €81,892. Of this there was one solicitor’s invoice for €29,040 relating to its move to Yeats House, Ballincollig, which should have been tendered for but was not.

At yesterday’s meeting, Cllr Humphrey Deegan (FG) asked why there were legal invoices for more than €81,000 available to the auditors but the total legal bill reported to the department for 2008 was just €17,538.

Acting chief executive Joan Russell said she would deal with the issue specifically at another point in the meeting. But this was not discussed during the public session.

In 2010, CCVEC was involved in a courtroom dispute over membership of its committee, which cost up to €60,000.

Earlier this year the department instructed CCVEC not to use public money seeking legal advice to see if it had been defamed. This followed a newspaper investigation into how it spent money.

At last month’s meeting Mr Deegan pressed Ms Russell for details of this particular bill.

The minutes of that meeting recorded Ms Russell saying Mr Deegan’s questions on the matter were “bordering on harassment”.

CCVEC yesterday app-roved its accounts for 2011. It is currently the subject on a regular, on-site, three-week annual audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General’s office.

The meeting of CCVEC also approved the extension of Ms Russell’s contract as acting chief executive until September.

Yesterday’s meeting was relocated back to its headquarters in Ballincollig because of a picket placed outside by staff of its crèche in Fermoy, which it is planning to close, moving services to Mallow.