By: Michael O’Farrell
Investigations Editor – Irish Mail on Sunday
A COUNCIL executive received an €86k grant to renovate her business property while she was on the local development board that awarded the funding.
A COUNCIL executive received an €86k grant to renovate her business property while she was on the local development board that awarded the funding.
Kathleen Prendergast – economic development officer for Tipperary County Council – got a grant in 2012 to renovate a house she now rents to tourists for almost €1,000 a week.
When Ms Prendergast and her husband, Michael Crowe, received the grant she represented the council as a board member on the South Tipperary Development Company Ltd. STDC is responsible for allocating millions in rural development and social inclusion grants to local groups and enterprises.
Ms Prendergast joined the STDC board in April 2011 and remained a member until November 2014.
The board agreed to begin funding tourist accommodation projects for the first time three weeks before Ms Prendergast became a member – and widely publicised the availability of this funding.
The July 2012 grant provided to Ms Prendergast was awarded under the EU-funded Leader rural development programme.
Leader grant rules do not exclude board members of local development groups from making applications for funding.
However, the grant to Ms Prendergast was not disclosed as a related-party transaction by STDC in its annual financial statements.
Instead, the development company’s audited accounts – filed in the Company Registrations Office – stated that ‘no transactions with related parties’ had taken place.
Last night both the STDC and Ms Prendergast said the decision to award the grant had been properly dealt with since Ms Prendergast declared her interest and that this did not influence the evaluation committee’s decision to award funding.
‘The company and Ms Prendergast followed all protocols in relation to conflict of interest,’ STDC boss Isabel Cambie told the MoS.
‘Ms Prendergast absented herself from the meeting while her project was discussed. This is noted in the minutes of the meeting.’
When pressed about why the grant had not been listed as a related-party disclosure in the accounts, Ms Cambie said the omission had been ‘an oversight’. She confirmed that Ms Prendergast is the only board member to have ever received a STDC grant.
Ms Prendergast used the Leader grant to renovate the home of her deceased mother, which is located just beneath the Rock of Cashel landmark. The four bedroom, selfcatering accommodation is advertised for rent on tourist sites for €115-€133 a night – just under €1,000 a week.
Once the childhood home of Ms Prendergast, the house is popular with tourists from around the world who have left many five-star Trip Advisor reviews in recent years.
‘This is the best rental place we have ever stayed at in Ireland… The house is spectacular,’ wrote one recent guest.
‘It has been recently refurbished to high standards – tastefully decorated and with a great eat-in kitchen fully equipped with all one needs in a home,’ wrote another.
When asked about the grant by the MoS, Ms Prendergast – a one-time chair of Tipperary Credit Union – said the finance was ‘made available on the same basis as to all other grantees. Applications were considered by an evaluation committee which I was not involved in, nor was I privy to any oral or written communications to the board regarding the project,’ she said.
She said she had ‘declared a conflict of interest’ and had absented herself when the project came up for consideration at board level.
Asked about the failure to declare the grant, Ms Prendergast said she could not comment since her term on the board had concluded.
Under rules set by the Accounting Standards Board and the Institute of Chartered Accountants any transfer of assets from a company to related parties such as board members must be disclosed.
The Department of Rural and Community Development – which oversees Leader grants – said it had ‘no function’ as to whether such related-party grants are disclosed, adding that disclosures are ‘a matter for the board of that company.’
…And She Won A Car In Credit Union Draw.
Kathleen Prendergast was chair of tipperary Credit Union in 2014 when she won a renault Clio in the members’ monthly draw.
Ms Prendergast told the Irish Mail on Sunday she was ‘fortunate to win’ having subscribed to the draw ‘on the same basis as all others.
She said she ‘did not influence’ the draw, which was independently supervised and audited.
‘I was not consulted upon nor did I participate in or influence in any manner the conduct of the draw, which was conducted in accordance with the applicable rules,’ she said.
Ms Prendergast was appointed to the Credit Union restructuring Board (ReBo) in 2012 and received directorship fees of €8,500 in 2013.
However, she was not entitled to this payment under the government’s ‘one person, one salary principle’, which forbids someone working in the public service from earning directorship fees on a state board.
When the error was discovered, the government agreed that the money did not have to be repaid so long as the board complied with public sector rules for future payments.
Asked previously about this, Ms Prendergast said she was paid the board fee without requesting it and was not asked to repay it when the error was discovered.
