Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I apologise, as I missed the witnesses' addresses. I will pick them up on a point. Someone stated that €5 billion was the expenditure per annum across local authorities. That is a great deal of money. I support Senator Boyhan's assertion that local authorities and their auditors should appear before the Committee of Public Accounts.

Is a chief auditor's report published annually? Are trends in the various audits published and circulated widely? Is it on the LGAS website or somewhere else? It would be important.

Some local authorities, such as Louth, purchased landbanks at significant cost. Through no one's fault, seeing as how land prices collapsed, the authorities have been left servicing a large debt. Many of their resources that should be going towards current expenditure are instead going towards that debt, which is having a negative impact on councils' financial capacity to deliver a good service.

The gentleman from the CCMA told us that he believed the auditors were dealing with this matter and that something was happening. I do not know whether I have remembered his words exactly. For councils to function properly, this debt should not rest with them. Perhaps the witnesses have a view on this. Some councils have been able to get this debt removed whereas others have not. Louth has a serious problem.

I welcome the fact that there is a chief auditor's report. Some of the criticisms of local authorities relate to value for money and significant overruns. Would the LGAS undertake a value for money report on certain issues across all councils, for example, where projects worth more than €20,000 or €40,000 have seen significant overruns in excess of whatever the service deems to be a reasonable figure?

One of things people complain about is work which sometimes goes on interminably and nobody seems to be responsible or accountable for it. Everybody knows that something is going on and that the contracts are possibly not professionally proofed. I am not saying that is what happened in a case we had in Drogheda some years ago but it went on for an entire year in the centre of the town and destroyed business in the area. I never found out the reason that happened but it was a disaster. I am highlighting the issue of significant impact on the ability of a town to function. Will someone comment on what happens if it is brought to the attention of a local authority? Part of the issue is that the project ought to have been priced differently, for example, if the contract had been completed by a certain time, there ought to have been a benefit to the contractor rather than it having been the case that the longer they were there, the more money they got. I am not an auditor so I do not have any knowledge in that regard but it is an issue.

The other point I wish to raise relates to fraud. I will not say where it was but it has been brought to my attention. It was not in County Louth. There was a court case and a conviction for fraud. A business person lost millions and he lost his business as a result. The Garda prosecuted in the case but the person still has questions arising in respect of the local authority. I rang the auditor in Dublin and we got a letter from him saying he would investigate the matter but he was forbidden by law to correspond further with the complainant. The problem is that the we do not know what has happened. We have not seen the report. The auditor did say it would be part of the audit he was doing but the person does not know what has happened and is very concerned and agitated about it.

I accept that an auditor should not and cannot get directly involved, but if there has been a court case, there ought to be a better way of dealing with the local authority aspect of the matter rather than have the person concerned coming into me every couple of months to inquire if I have heard what is going on. He wants to know what the Garda is doing and what the local authority is doing. He suffered a grave injustice. The courts acted on that and convicted a person for it. Another issue that must be addressed is whether there is a better way of dealing with such cases than a complainant not knowing what is going on. He has not been told whether the audit has been completed. I do not even know if the audit has been completed. That is not fair, right nor just. The person has lost his entire business as a result having been defrauded of millions.