€9m in EU funds to aid redundant Dell workers not spent

MORE THAN €9 million in EU funding secured to assist redundant workers from computer giant Dell was not spent, more than three years after the employees lost their jobs.

It is now expected a significant proportion of the €35 million in funding to support and retrain 9,000 construction workers will also have to be returned to the European Commission because of a failure to meet deadlines for the funding.

Sinn Féin finance spokesman Pearse Doherty has called for an independent inquiry into the management and administration of the European Globalisation Fund projects for Dell, SR Technics and Waterford Crystal and for some 9,000 redundant construction workers.

Last October Minister for Education and Skills Ruairí Quinn acknowledged there was a problem of “maladministration” in the funds, which he said was by the “previous administration”.

Mr Doherty, who has asked successive parliamentary questions in recent months about the administration of the fund, said it was a “scandal that 40 per cent of a fund intended for workers made redundant in 2008 was unspent, more than three years after those workers lost their jobs”.

Minister of State Ciarán Cannon confirmed in a parliamentary reply yesterday €13.619 million of the fund had been spent. The State received €22.8 million. The globalisation fund provides assistance to EU member states to support and retrain redundant workers.

The Minister also revealed letters to access supports from the fund had only been sent out on December 19th to construction workers made redundant between July 2009 and June 2010.

Mr Cannon said at least 4,500 “interventions” had started by November with construction workers. He added that “there was no requirement to inform each individual in advance of approval” by the EU for the funding.

EU approval is only given a year after application but most EU member states who apply for funding use their own resources and then reclaim the funds.