Volume 1 | Volume 2 | Appropriation Accounts
€116bn pension liability
The State's occupational pension bill liability for public servants at the end of December 2009 was €116bn.
That is the latest estimate made.
Those liabilities represent the present value of the cash payments that fall to be met over the next 60 years as of 31 December 2009.
The National Pension Reserve Fund was valued at €22.7bn on 31 December 2010.
The discretionary investment of the NPRF stood at €15bn on that date.
An additional €11.3bn of the fund's assets had been devoted to bank capitalisation.
The market value of investments in the banks was €7.6bn.
A further €10bn of NPRF funds have since been committed towards bank stabilisation.
The Government's commitments to be met for public-private partnership contracts at the end of 2010 is estimated at €4.3bn - up from €4.1bn at the same time in 2009.
Bank liabilities of €113bn guaranteed
The Government had guaranteed liabilities in the banks valued at €113bn at the end of December.
It has a further commitment to meet any shortfall in value of collateral under the Exceptional Liquidity Assistance Scheme.
The Central Bank had advanced €49.5bn in such funds by the end of 2010.
Welfare overpayments
The Department of Social Protection recorded welfare overpayments of more than €83.4m in 2010, with €31m of these being obtained through fraud.
With only 25% of the overpaid money ever recovered, over the past five years a total of €315m was outstanding in terms of unrecovered funds.
A number of reasons are given for overpayment, including people accidentally receiving two welfare payments for separate entitlements.
However, last year 31% of the overpayments were as a result of fraud.
The Department attempts to recover the money, the report found, although a tiny percentage of some 2-3% of cases end up in court.
The Department is now to review its recovery procedures, including the pursuit of foreign nationals accused of welfare fraud but who may now live in another EU state.
State spending €53.8bn
The cost of overall State expenditure in 2010 was €53.8bn. According to the report it was a reduction of 9.5% on 2009.
€725m was issued in 2010 to acquire shares in banks.
The State paid €979m on servicing the national debt.
The report also says that €4.8m was paid to political parties under the Electoral Act.
Revenue falls to €47.6bn
The report found revenue continued to drop in 2010 but at a lesser rate.
The gross amount collected by Revenue declined from €50.7bn in 2009 to €47.6bn in 2010.
Net proceeds of taxes and duties collected in 2010 amounted to €31.75bn.
According to the report, overall tax revenues for the year exceeded levels forecast by €703m.
Income Tax and VAT, which account for two thirds of the collection, both fell by 5%.
Borrowing rose to €148.1bn
Overall public borrowing increased to €148.1bn at the end of 2010.
Gross National Debt accounted for €109.6bn of that liability.
The balance was partly made up of promissory notes totalling €30.9bn to recapitalise the banks.
Other miscellaneous State borrowing, including debts for non-commercial State bodies, the HSE, local government debt, the Westlink buyout and others factors, accounted for a further €7.6bn.
Debt service costs increased by €1bn or 31% in 2010, which is mainly due to the increase in the amount of the debt.
Tax take falls by €2.5bn
The C&AG report estimates that the tax take was reduced by €2.5bn last year due to companies' losses from previous years being used to offset their corporation tax bill.
The C&AG report says big losses from the financial and construction sectors have not yet been used, and will have a "significant impact" on tax revenues in future years.
Revenue told the C&AG, however, that it was unlikely that much of these losses would be used to offset tax payments, as some loss-making banks were being wound down and were unlikely to have profits in future.
The C&AG estimates that around €50bn of losses were unused last year - €34bn in the financial sector.
Under legislation, institutions participating in NAMA can offset only half of their profits in any year against available losses.
Oireachtas running costs decrease
The total cost of running the Orieachas fell from €123.206m in 2009 to €107.197m last year.
Payments for salaries of Oireachtas members (TDs and Senators) fell from €23.7m in 2009 to €20.98m m in 2010.
This did not include additional elements of salary due to the Taoiseach or ministers, which are paid by the relevant department.
The grant in aid for Ciste Pinsean Tithe an Oireachtas (Pension Scheme) fell from €10.340m in 2009 to €10m in 2010.
However, travel expenses rose from €5.174m in 2009 to €5.962m last year.
The cost of secretarial assistance for non-office holders also rose from €19.5m in 2009 to almost €20.5m.
The cost of other services, including catering and bar staff, televising Oireachtas proceedings, expenses relating to Oireachtas committees and a pension scheme for secretarial assistants fell from €6.8m in 2009 to €4.256m in 2010.
€73.4m paid for bank consultancy
The report also says that a total of almost €73.4m has been paid out by the State on consultancy costs linked to the banking crisis, including €31.4m so far this year.
Financial advice accounted for €35m of the total, while legal services cost €22.5m.
Economic forum cost €330,000
The cost of holding the Global Economic Forum which took place in Farmleigh in September 2009 was €330,000.
The forum brought together 130 people from home and abroad to suggest ways of bringing about economic recovery.
The report cites an accounting officer who stated the costs of the forum were kept to a minimum.
Participants paid for their own travel costs and the accommodation provided by the Department was chosen at hotels close to the venue and at competitive prices with an average of less than €100 a night.
€61,000 was spent on catering, hotel bills came to €37,000 and €18,000 was spent on transport.
The report concludes there has been a reasonable level of tracking and reporting on the proposals of participants.
Another forum will be held next month.
€2bn for roads, public transport
Gross voted capital expenditure was approximately €6.3bn.
€2bn was spend on roads and public transport, while €495m was spent on water services investment.
Social housing and estate regeneration accounted for €746m.
€589m went on grants to private enterprise in agriculture and industry.
€616m was spent on building and equipping educational facilities.
These figures were before taking account of capital receipts.
Time, cost overrun on fingerprint system
There was a cost and time overrun introducing a new fingerprint system for use by the gardaí.
€18m was the original cost estimate but €23m was spent on the project.
The report says the full benefits of the system, which brings about a more modern fingerprinting system, are not being realised because of industrial action at the Garda National Immigration Bureau.
There was also an 18-month delay in introducing the system.
It says there are still a significant number of fingerprints being taken by An Garda Síochána using the manual 'wet ink' system.
The report concludes that from a project delivery point of view, 'the overall project management arrangements were sufficient to ensure that the system was delivered to the desired specification.'
Food, hygiene non-compliance
The report says there appears to be a significant level of non-compliance by food operators with food and hygiene regulations.
The comments are made in a chapter dealing with the compensation scheme set up in 2008 after the contaminated pigmeat scare.
€102m has been paid out under the scheme but the final payout bill could rise to €130m.
It also says there is a risk that a small element of the EU co-funding of €7.9m may not be received.
Withdrawn book cost €98,000
The report has found the National Library of Ireland was obliged to withdraw a book from publication, which cost almost €98,000 to produce and publish.
The book 'The National Library of Ireland' was removed from sale due to the level of errors and other defects.
Ancillary costs of €33,000 were also incurred.
The report also finds there was a failure to carry out the related procurement of research services in an open and competitive way.
A review by the Library, carried out after the book was withdrawn from sale, found deficiencies in the manner in which the Library carried out the tender competition and the award of the contract to the selected researcher.
It found the tender submitted by the researcher on 28 April 2008 was evaluated by one member of staff of the Library and there was no documentary evidence of the evaluation and scoring.
A day after receipt of the first tender, a contract was offered to someone who had sought the tender, providing for her “to carry out research, produce texts and engage in other tasks as required in order to produce an exhibition
and publications on the general theme of (National Library of Ireland) treasures scheduled to open in
Spring 2009”
It also found there was no documentary evidence that the three other tender submissions received later in response to the Library's Requests for Tender were formally evaluated and no other applicant was assigned to the panel of researchers, or awarded a contract.
The Director stated the Library is satisfied that it has invested significant effort into improving procurement and contract management practices in an effort to provide best value for public expenditure.
Hospital co-location
The HSE has told the C&AG that all discussions with preferred bidders for co-location hospitals has ceased and that it has no proposals to progress any of the projects.
The co-location project was proposed in 2005 by then Minister for Health Mary Harney and project agreements for Beaumont, Cork, Limerick and St James's Hospital were signed in 2008.
Planning permission was granted for each project but the project agreements expired at the end of March this year, when the time allowed for the preferred bidders to secure funding had passed.
The legal and financial costs associated with the procurement of the co-located hospitals project is €1.46m to date.
To date there have been no legal costs in association with the expiry of the co-location agreements.
Dental claims
24 instances of dentists claiming twice for the same patients and similar treatments under free dental schemes are recorded in the C&AG report.
Despite cuts in dental benefit, two separate schemes remain for basic dental care - one is funded by the HSE, the other is funded by the Department of Social Protection.
The HSE scheme applies to medical card holders, while the Department of Social Protection is the standard PRSI scheme.
Certain treatments are eligible for dual entitlement, though not dual payment. The HSE scheme paid out €76.2m last year.
In an audit of 100 sample cases, 24 patients appeared on both lists for similar treatments just months apart.
The C&AG said in the view of the number of cases contained in such a small sample it would be "prudent" to review a greater number of cases.
HSE tax settlement
The HSE had to make a tax settlement totalling €3.35m in 2010, according to the report.
Revenue audits found underpayments of PAYE/PRSI, VAT, Relevant Contracts Tax and Professional Services Withholding Tax, giving rise to tax, interest and penalty settlements with Revenue totalling €3.35m.
In 2010, a "self-review" identified an erroneous underpayment of VAT which was the subject of a voluntary disclosure to Revenue in accordance with the Code of Practice for Revenue Audit.
During 2010 internal audits of a number of consultancies were undertaken.
These audits revealed that vendors were paid €3.2m (over a number of years) in respect of services for which no competitive procurement processes were conducted. This constituted a breach of established regulations.
Additional controls have been introduced for the approval and monitoring of consultancy expenditure.
HSE spent €22m on consultancy advice
The HSE spent €22m on consultancy advice in 2009, without a business rationale for most of the work being put in place.
The C&AG report said of 27 consultancies examined, only 10 were publicly tendered, while in many of the projects there was limited detail in respect of pricing or the expected project duration.
A&L Goodbody received almost €2m for work on the hospital co-location programme, over a four-year period from 2006-2010.
Anderson Editorial received just over €1m for advice on communications and media relations during the same period.
The report said overall the HSE consultancy programme needed a performance focus, and that in a substantial amount of cases there was limited monitoring of the work being carried out.
Private health insurance companies
The C&AG also criticised unacceptably long delays in collecting income due from private health insurance companies.
He found the difficulties in income collection are caused primarily by delays by consultants in signing claims due for reimbursement.
The claims comprise two main elements - the HSE's statutory charge for the hospital bed and the consultant's private fee income.
The HSE has sought to collect the statutory charge from the insurers, independent of the consultant's private fee income, prior to sign off of the entire claim by the consultant.
However, the C&AG says this change to the claims process has not been facilitated by the private health insurers.
The HSE has sought the support of the Minister of Health in improving income collection in the current environment through enabling legislative changes to the claims process.
Lost water still an issue
The C&AG also concluded that despite an investment of over €1bn in water conservation measures, the amount of water lost through leaks at present may be the same as the amount lost in the mid 1990s.
The report says that unaccounted for water levels in Ireland appear to be at levels twice the OECD average of 20%.
It says €1bn has been spent in the last 10 years to try the fix the problem which arises through leakages, poor service connections and metering errors.
