Council investigation raised at Public Accounts Committee

The investigation into allegations of false invoicing at Cavan County Council, subject of a protected disclosure in 2017, remains “open” the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has been told.

The current status of the probe was clarified before the PAC who in recent weeks examined arrangements in place for accountability and oversight on expenditure in local government at the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage.

Graham Doyle, Secretary General at the department, was among those pressed for an update, particularly in light of last March’s RTÉ Investigates programme that looked at allegations around local authorities across Ireland.

In 2021, the council refused The Anglo-Celt access to information on the basis that the records sought “relate to matters the subject of an ongoing Garda investigation”.

However, the RTÉ Investigates’ report claimed: “Gardaí in Cavan are not aware of any investigations in relation to this matter, at this time.”

Fine Gael TD Colm Burke raised the matter, stating there has been “no publication of the results of that investigation” and added: “This is public money. It is taxpayers’ money and it is ratepayers’ money. How does the Department deal with a situation where there are investigations and still no reports have been published or made available to the public?”

“In a number of cases, some of the situations that were noted in the programme were subject to Garda and other investigations,” said Mr Doyle, before deferring to Diarmuid O’Leary, principal officer at the department to respond further.

Mr O’Leary stated: “While the ‘RTÉ Investigates’ report said there was no Garda investigation, in fact the information we have from Cavan County Council is that it was informed by An Garda Síochána that the file is not closed. It is not that there is no investigation, the open file remains open.

“That is a great line with regard to ‘We cannot give you any information’,” responded Deputy Burke, who said he’d like someone from An Garda Síochána to confirm that the file is officially “not closed”.

“I like it when people can give me the full facts but, in this case, they are saying that there was no Garda investigation. Now we are being told something different inside here. Will the Department come back to us with clear information that there is still an ongoing Garda file and that it is not closed?,” said the Cork based representative.

“As I said, we can certainly come back to the Deputy, but the information provided by Cavan County Council is that the file is not closed,” confirmed Mr O’Leary.

Under questioning from Wexford Independent TD, Verona Murphy, the General Secretary Mr Doyle was questioned on what he “personally” had done to address the situation in Cavan following the RTÉ programme.

“I am satisfied that the overall system, in terms of the overall controls of expenditure of public money, is designed to call out situations where issues, anomalies or frauds or anything else arise,” he said, before Deputy Murphy asked if any sanctions had been handed down?

“Has anyone been put on garden leave?” she asked.

“No, and we would not have the power to do that,” he replied.

“Have there been no suspensions?”

“We would not have the power to do that in local authorities.”

Cavan County Council commissioned an external investigator, former Wicklow County Manager Eddie Sheehy, to review the allegations contained in the 2017 Protected Disclosure and prepare a report on the matter.

The report was completed in August 2018. It has never been published, and the council has thus far refused to release it.

The council claims the release of any such records could “prejudice or impair” their investigation.

A spokesperson for Cavan County Council, when asked by The Anglo-Celt to clarify the current situation regarding the investigation, responded: “Cavan County Council will not be commenting on this matter at this time.”