Gary Gannon (Dublin Central, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

As time is limited, I will raise an issue that has not been raised by any of my colleagues across the Chamber. On 30 June, the Arts Council advertised a tender for badly needed communications advice. Many of the major agencies in the country applied in good faith. The tender documentation stated the successful agency would commence work in August 2020. Even though the assessment and evaluations must have taken place, the Arts Council sent out a notice last week stating it had terminated the competition without awarding a contract. It gave a very strange reason that I and many others would be curious to understand in more detail, namely, that it was setting up a new communications group to produce a strategy for itself. This is curious because the very first paragraph of the tender document, as initiated, states, "Advise on and assist with the development and implementation of the Arts Council's public relations, public affairs and media relations strategies, particularly in the context of the Arts Council's 10-year strategy; design work plans for these activities, including the identification of stakeholders and pathways to interact with them; and, with the assistance of the Arts Council, review annually the delivery of the communications plan and devise recommendations for improvement."

For reasons I shall outline as my contribution develops, I believe the Arts Council has acted in bad faith to such an extent that an independent investigation is warranted into the issue. The inquiry should look for all the relevant papers and records. If that does not happen, the Arts Council will be inundated with freedom of information requests on this matter.

Agencies will have put a major effort into the very demanding tender application process. It will have cost them well into the tens of thousands of euro in terms of the commitment of staff and production. The agencies in question are all in the creative industry in these troubled times.

The last body one would expect to mess around with small businesses is the Arts Council, which deals with creatives, artists and small groups. What it has done, four months after the tender was advertised, is highly unprofessional and calls into question its board and executive. It disrespects those who spent time on a very demanding tender. At a minimum, they should be compensated for the time spent on the tender, which proved to be of no avail. This raises the need for the matter to be investigated by somebody independent. What went on in the Arts Council in this regard? What happened since the tender was advertised in June? What happened to the submissions made by the agencies who tendered? Were they assessed? Who assessed them? Was there an independent person or persons among the assessors? What have they to say about this? What did the assessors find? Why are the agencies being told only now? Will the Arts Council use the agencies' ideas? Is this just a free way to get the intellectual property and ideas of others? Is this a proper way to do business? What was the Arts Council's true reason for its actions? Has there been any potential conflict of interest on the board or executive? Did somebody not like the assessment? A multitude of questions need answers, and that is why I believe the matter warrants an independent inquiry.

If the Comptroller and Auditor General were examining this issue, his approach would be very technical and he would ask whether the Arts Council abided by the guidelines. That is the approach that is needed in this inquiry. The Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform needs to be asked for his view. As a chartered accountant, he might not be too happy to hear that the decision taken by the Arts Council to withdraw, after four months, a public tender that it advertised is adding to the very serious pressure already on small businesses. He might feel he has to do something to investigate activity that appears to be so incredibly unprofessional that it warrants further investigation.

The excuse given by the Arts Council for withdrawing the tender raises more questions because the first reference in the tender material is to the communications strategy. That is not something new that has just happened. To the bemusement and frustration of those creative agencies that made a great effort to put together a tender application, the excuse given by the Arts Council as to why the tender was withdrawn seems to be identical to the reason it was initiated in the first instance. The only grounds for the cancellation of a tender are exceptional circumstances. This hardly qualifies as such. The Arts Council is tone deaf to artists and agencies and it should not be allowed to get away with what it has done to artists, and now agencies.

Some local authorities have come under criticism recently for cancelling tender processes without good reason. This, too, needs to be examined. It underscores that the last thing one would expect from the Arts Council would be messing around with creative, indigenous small businesses at this incredibly precarious time.

It is interesting to note that the three reasons set out by the Office of Government Procurement that State agents may cancel a tender do not include the fig leaf presented by the Arts Council last week.

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