Government waste for 2011 estimated at over €22m

Government departments lost €22.2 million as a result of waste in 2011, according to an official estimate provided to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC).

The figure was provided to the committee ahead of a meeting today at which the 2011 report of the Comptroller and Auditor General will be discussed.

At the last meeting of the committee, Fianna Fáil TD Seán Fleming asked if a total figure for waste identified in the 2011 report could be provided by the Department of Public Expenditure.

The secretary general of the department, Robert Watt, has written to the PAC in advance of today’s meeting specifying that the total financial losses of Government departments as identified in the report was €22.2 million. It was not specified where those losses occurred, but the report said some €20 million worth were incurred in the health service.

Mr Watt also referred in his letter to overspending by the Department of Communications and the Department of Tourism. The overspend in communications arose from a grant of to Teilifís na Gaeilge estimated at €33.6 million in 2011, but which turned out to be €36.3 million.

The overspend in tourism was €4.7 million. It arose from a grantof €46.1 million to the tourism marketing fund when just €41.4 million had been allocated in the estimates.

Irish contractors
Details of the number of public tenders awarded to Irish contractors, compared to foreign-based contractors, were also contained in the letter.

Since 2009 the National Procurement Service has been responsible for an overall procurement spend of between €14 billion and €16 billion a year.

Contracts for works worth more than €5 million and services and supplies over €130,000 must be advertised in the Official Journal of the European Union. In 2011 there were 747 contracts awarded to Irish suppliers, and 123 to non-Irish outfits.

In terms of value, Irish suppliers won over €2 billion worth of contracts, or 89.5 per cent of the total, and non-Irish suppliers €240 million or 10.5 per cent.

Mr Watt said the figures related only to procurements above the procurement limits and where the nationality of the winning tenderer was disclosed. “The NPS estimates that less than 5 per cent of the overall spend (ie, total spend on contracts under and over the EU thresholds) went to non-Irish entities.”