Council still owed €3m despite employing debt firm

Refuse charge defaulters still owe Cork County Council over €3m in unpaid bills — despite the local authority employing a private debt collection agency to help recover the arrears.

The monies have been outstanding from thousands of former customers after the council sold off its refuse service to Country Clean in Sept 2010.

It emerged the council was still owed €3,377,317 at the end of last year, despite collecting €67,000 itself.