Consultant costs - Cullen must come clean on spending

An aspect of Transport Minister Martin Cullen’s expensive penchant for spending taxpayers’ money on outside experts is to be subjected to Dáil scrutiny today.

During the course of his time as Minister for the Environment, consultants benefited to the tune of an extraordinary €9.2 million, despite the fact that he already had an array of advisers in his department.

One of those who has enjoyed the minister’s patronage to quite a sizeable extent - €11,200 a month - was Monica Leech, his former campaign manager, and it is this which will be the subject of parliamentary questions from Fine Gael.