Stagg 'amazed' at E8.6m consultants bill
COUNTY HALL, 9 October 2002: Information provided following a motion by Deputy Emmet Stagg, seeking information on the number of engineers and consultants employed by Kildare County Council, shows that E8.6m was spent on such outside contractors in the three-year period 1999-2001.
Deputy Stagg says he is ‘amazed’ at the results and says that very often the high expenditure is a waste of public money as no funding is provided for the implementation of the Consultants reports.
“A case in point is the recent consultants report on flooding in the Ardclough area,” he notes. “While the consultants have been paid, there is no plan or proposal whereby the one million euros will be found to actually carry out the works proposed. It seems that ‘hot issues’ such as flooding are kicked out to touch by the appointment of consultants while in some cases the cost of the consultants report would be sufficient to do all or most of the works required.”
Deputy Stagg also says that what he terms the ‘disease’ of Consultants for Everything’ also ties up the council’s own engineers in monitoring the progress of the consultants and assessing their reports.
“Regularly, the projects to be assessed are simple and straightforward and are well within the competence of our own professional staff at Kildare County Council. Yet we spent E37,000 on consultants who told us all what we knew already but whose report failed to deal with the flooding at the Straffan Inn.”
The main proposal in this report is to put a pipe from the middle of the village to the drain on the Lodge Park road. The pipe would cost about E40,000 and would eliminate the flooding in that area. “However, while the money was available for the Consultant (E40,000) there is no money for the required pipe (E40,000) and of course, the council’s engineers were tied up monitoring and assessing.” Deputy Stagg points out.
He has requested the chairperson of the council, Mayor Jim Reilly, to have this subject placed on the formal agenda of the next County Council meeting.
Consultants and their fees for the period are as follows: B.S.M. (Development Plans) 267,821; Shaffrey (Development Plans) 58,382; Cunnane Stratton Reynolds (Development Plan) 24,125; Nicholas O’Dwyer (Sewerage) 4,566,839; P.J. Tobin (Sewerage) 430,747; T.J. O’Connor (Osberstown) 1,752,239; M.C. O’Sullivan (Osberstown) 711,284; Carlbro Ireland (Sewerage) 98,669; Doyle and King (Water and Sewerage) 260,319; Pat Joyce (Water) 10,752; D.B.F.L. (Water) 27,655; Fehily Timoney (Environment Waste) 471,474.
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The RehabCare Bear fundraising week begins Monday 14 October and a number of schools in the county are taking part in the selling of emblems to help raise money for Rehab activities. They include schools in Blessington, Celbridge, Kilashee, Kilcullen, Rathangan, Clane and Allen. The emblems cost E2 each. The initiative aims to raise E1.27m over three years to help care for some 1,700 people a year.
A guided walk around Donadea Forest next Sunday 13 October will be the Kildare county involvement in the Feile Samhna na gCrann. The walk will start at the Castle at 2.30pm and will be conducted by park manager George Hipwell. The event will include folklore of trees in poetry and song.
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