Disability booklet could have been printed here
However, Irish citizens should certainly have issue with the negative impact that State procurement decisions are having on our own national industries, on jobs and on the economy as a whole.
Agreeably, the NDA, as with any other public body, is subject to national and EU rules on public procurement. Contracts on the scale of the NDA booklet, New Disability Plans, must go to EU tender, but other EU countries utilise the ‘wriggle room’ within the legislation to support their national industries.
This is common practice throughout Europe, and nowhere more so than in France.
The French are currently considering legislation which would aim to ensure that at least 20% of procurement spend be allotted to French small to medium enterprises (SMEs).
According to Angela Kerins, chairperson of the National Disability Authority (Letters, July 23), the NDA, when printing the booklet last year, was “obliged” to advertise the contract through this EU process and to obtain the “best value” for money for the Irish taxpayer’.
However, the best value for the Irish taxpayer is that business — whether it be print or any other spend of taxpayers’ money — stays in Ireland and proper consideration to the true calculation of ‘cost’ be given to lost revenue from PAYE contributions, loss from corporate tax, lost opportunity as a result of bringing material into the country, loss of jobs, and the cost of printing press junkets to foreign countries, etc.
Ms Kerins says: “The decision to award the contract to the successful printer was based on the criteria set out in the EU tender document and was carried out in a fair, legal and transparent manner.”
This is a total cop-out and fairly typical of State procurement.
We’re great Europeans in Ireland when it comes to using taxpayers’ funds to buy abroad, but pretty lousy at preventing manufacturing jobs leaving this island.
The booklet deal was “fair” — but only if we use the same waffle we rejected in the recent Lisbon Treaty.
Last April, 130 jobs were lost at Microprint in Tallaght, Dublin, at the same time that the lucrative contract to print the RTÉ Guide, worth some €3.5 million annually to Irish industry and lots more to the Irish economy, was issued to an English printer.
RTÉ also followed a fair, transparent and legal process.
The Lisbon Treaty documentation putting forward a yes vote and sent to Irish homes prior to the vote was printed in Belgium, yet a sensitive address database of Irish citizens was used.
The recent Department of Defence Emergency Booklet was printed in Ireland but didn’t appear to go the same tender route as other State procurement deals: a classic example of utilising the wriggle room within the policy. There are many other examples.
Ms Kerins’s clarification of the NDA deal is hollow.
The true medium to long term cost of State procurement practices to the Irish taxpayer and Irish exchequer is unknown and needs immediate attention. The procurement policy is not wrong — it’s the implementation that is wrong. Hopefully, if more Irish citizens question State procurement decisions we may get some real answers and, more importantly, the best possible value for our taxpayers’ money.
Donie O’Leary (Letters, July 16) was right to question the decision regarding this booklet being printed in Italy. It should and could have been printed in Ireland.
Paul Feeney
Editor
Irish Printer
Jemma Publications Ltd
Grattan House
Temple Road
Blackrock
Co Dublin
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