Over €30m spent by Government departments on external legal, HR, accountancy, and consultancy services

This includes €14.3m by the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications alone, with over €10m allocated for costs associated with the National Broadband Plan

Eamon Ryan's department has paid out over €10m to private consultants who provided advice on the National Broadband Plan in the last year alone.

Government departments have spent over €30m hiring external legal teams, HR specialists, accountancy firms, and consultants in the past year.

The most sizeable portion of this was spent by the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications, which racked up a €14.3m bill, including over  €10m of external legal and consultancy advice on the National Broadband Plan (NDP).

Well-known consultant and advisory companies Mazars, Ernst & Young, and KPMG feature regularly on the list of outsourced work as well as third-level institutions.

Although the Chief State Solicitor's Office (CSSO) provides litigation, advisory, and conveyancing services to Government departments, over €1.49m was spent hiring some of the country's top legal firms including William Fry, Matheson, and Arthur Cox.

The figures, which reveal the extent to which Government departments rely on private consultants, do not include the Departments of Education and Higher Education as spending for 2021 is still being calculated. 

The Department of Public Expenditure and Reform has only has published details of expenditure up to the end of September.

Labour TD Seán Sherlock questioned what he called the increasing level of dependency Departments now have on private firms and called on the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) to investigate the spending.

"It's important that all monies spent by government departments are published and that transparency exists," said Mr Sherlock, who received details of the spending through a series of parliamentary questions.

"In latter years we're witnessing an increased dependency on outside expertise. 

Some matters will need external assistance but the pandemic has highlighted how much money the big consulting houses have made and that does warrant closer scrutiny through the PAC.

"Such a large spend on legal fees needs to be examined also."

The Department of Agriculture forked out over €4.4m on external consultants, the Department of Children spent €5.3m on private firms, while the outside consulting provided to the Department of Housing came to €1.8m.

The Department of the Taoiseach and the Department Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media said there had been no spending from the administrative budget on external consultancy.

National Broadband Plan

Eamon Ryan's department has paid out over €10m to private consultants who provided advice on the NDP in the last year alone.

In total, the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications spent over €14m recruiting outside legal, accounting, communications, and advisory firms in 2021.

However, the largest portion of this went to Ernst & Young, which charged €5.335m for "financial and commercial advisory services" relating to the NDP. 

Legal firm William Fry also got €846,000 for its work on the plan, while Analysis Mason, a telecoms, media, and technology consultancy firm, received €3.952m for advisory services.

The spending also included €87,000 which was paid to Moveplan Ireland Ltd for "relocation management" and a further €2,000 was spent on a social media review carried out by Fuzion Communications.

Management consulting firm McKinsey received €924,000 for the provision of economic analysis and a report to support the development and implementation of the Climate Action Plan 2021.

This was part of a €2.45m total spend on private firms that were recruited to work on climate action.

Responding to the parliamentary question from Mr Sherlock, Mr Ryan said: "The department is responsible for a diverse range of functions covering the communications, climate action, environment, energy, and natural resources sectors and the procurement of specialist services is necessary to support the delivery of policies and programmes in these areas. 

"In 2021 expenditure by my department on such services amounted to just over €14.3m."

In total, over €30m was spent by government departments on private consulting, legal, communications, and advisory services, with Mr Ryan's department accounting for the largest segment of any department by a considerable margin.

A number of departments defended the spending by stating that providers are only engaged where specific expertise is required which is not available in the organisation at the relevant time.

The Department of Children spent €5.3m on external consultants, while the Department of Agriculture bill came to €4.42m. This was followed by the Department of Housing which made €1.85m in payments to outside companies.

The Department of the Taoiseach and the Department Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport, and Media said there had been no spending from the administrative budget on external consultancy.

Arts Minister Catherine Martin said: "As has been previously advised to the house, my department commissions experts from time to time to provide technical reports or advice on specific issues. This work is not classified as consultancy services and is not funded from my department's administrative budget."