Aquatic Centre - Public funds are being squandered

THE murky waters of Ireland’s leaking National Aquatic Centre get cloudier by the day.

Taxpayers have every right to be furious over the Government’s failure to plug the massive leakage of money from the €62 million facility.

As a High Court judge has observed, it is “difficult to see” how €4.5 million was paid for unspecified services to a subsidiary of the centre’s parent company which had rent arrears of €1 million.

Mr Justice Peter Kelly also described as “nothing short of astonishing” that such a valuable asset was leased to a company with a share capital of a mere €127.

If the Taoiseach was not acutely embarrassed during yesterday’s Dáil debate over this debacle, a pet project of his along with the abortive Bertie Bowl, he should have been. This is yet another blatant example of how the coalition is squandering public money.