Over €10m spent on private security for social welfare offices since 2021

Sar Security notes its responsibilities under the Intreo contract as 'addressing aggressive behaviour with a professional manner' and 'maintaining order'. Picture: Andy Gibson.

The Department of Social Protection has spent more than €10m on providing private security for social welfare offices since the beginning of 2021.

Some €1.8m has been spent on providing security for 63 Intreo offices and 11 other department buildings across the country in 2024 to date, the department said.

The contract for providing security coverage for all social welfare offices has been held since October 2020 by Sar Security, an Irish company formed in 1997.

That initial contract was worth €14.1m and is due to expire in September 2024, a spokesperson for the department said.

Some €2.5m was spent on Sar’s services in 2021 by the department, which holds responsibility for administering Ireland’s welfare benefits programmes and is the largest State-sponsored entity in the country with an annual budget of €25.6bn in 2024.

A further €2.7m was spent with Sar in 2022, and €2.6m in 2023, with just over €700k of that year’s spending settled in 2024.

“Cost and demand for security services have [increased] and continue to increase in recent years,” the spokesperson said.

They said that the contract with Sar Security covers the provision of static security guard coverage and mobile security services.

Sar also operates as the secure key holding service provider for the department — that is, a private entity which holds duplicates of all keys for a business and is expected to respond to out-of-hours incidents and emergencies.

The company itself notes its responsibilities under the Intreo contract as “addressing aggressive behaviour with a professional manner” and “maintaining order”.

The company also has responsibility for alarm callouts at Intreo offices and for performing risk assessments at the 74 separate sites.

In a response to a parliamentary question from Social Democrats TD Catherine Murphy, the department said that a public procurement process is in progress for a new security contract upon the expiry of the current tender this September.