DDDA deficit rises to €71 million

The overall deficit in the accounts of the Dublin Docklands Development Authority grew to €71 million last year, an increase of €22.5 million on 2008, according to its annual report.

The authority was forced to writedown more than €10 million on its property assets in 2009 – adding to a writedown of some €186 million during the previous year.

DDDA chairman Prof Niamh Brennan apologised for the poor state of the authority’s finances and said it would "redouble" its efforts to breakeven.

"Our first priority must be to live within our means on a day-to-day operating basis and we are determined to achieve this as quickly as possible," she said.

The vast majority of the write down can be attributed to the authority’s involvement in the €412 million acquisition of the Irish Glass Bottle site in Ringsend, Dublin, in 2006.

The authority has a 26 per cent holding in the site, which is owned by the Becbay consortium. The site was valued at €50 million, less than one eighth of what it cost, at the end of last year.

The authority financed €4.4 million of interest charges for Becbay last year.

Prof Brennan said the work of the authority continued to be overshadowed by the legacy of past decisions – the Irish Glass Bottle site in particular.

"Clearly, these decisions have had an enormous detrimental impact on our operations and on our financial position in particular," she said.

The deficit in the authority’s consolidated income and expenditure account fell from €213 million in 2008 to €18.6 million last year. The value of its net assets fell from €26.2 million in 2008 to €4.1 million last year.

The DDDA's spend on regeneration decreased from €27.6 million in 2008 to €5.8 million last year.

The report says the authority’s income was €20.6 million last year. This was predominantly composed of social and affordable housing sales of €17.2 million. Staff numbers have fallen from 55 to 30.

“Given the financial challenges facing the authority, the executive has implemented stringent measures to reduce spend with significant reductions in administration, project and marketing spend,” the report says.

Prof Brennan said public confidence in the authority had regrettably "been seriously undermined" by a series of public controversies.

"My colleagues and I on the Executive Board are committed to doing all in our power to regain trust in the Authority which was so seriously undermined in recent years. Our guiding mission remains to complete the Docklands project for the community of the area and for taxpayers generally and we are determined to successfully finish out this project.”

Labour Party environment spokeswoman Joanna Tuffy said the problems experienced by the DDDA could be attributed to a lack of political supervision.

"The current disastrous situation is a direct result of some of the appointments made to the board of the authority in recent years, where banking and speculation seems to have been the criteria used for selection, rather than any commitment to the dockland area," she said.

Ms Tuffy said attempts to repair the authority's reputation were "very much a case of trying to bolt the stable door after the financial horse has bolted".