UL chief snubbed PAC grilling but ‘sent texts from across the road’
THE University of Limerick (UL) has been accused of telling the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) a ‘blatant lie’ over the absence of a senior staff member who was centrally involved in a controversial property deal.
UL’s chief corporate officer, Andrew Flaherty, failed to attend a PAC meeting last year, with members told at the time he had a ‘long-standing engagement’.
But it has now emerged Mr Flaherty was at a hotel across from Leinster House before and after the meeting, and had been texting UL officials while they were appearing before the PAC.
UL was before the PAC yesterday to answer questions on the purchase at an inflated price of 20 student houses in Rhebogue without proper planning permission, which has left a €5.2million dent in UL’s finances.
A review of the acquisition shows UL paid €11.4million for the houses, which were valued at €6.2million. A stamp duty bill pushed the overall cost to €12.5million, meaning each student house cost €629,000 – twice the price of similar properties in the area, three kilometres from UL.
The university is now under an investigation by the Higher Education Authority (HEA), whose officials spent several days on campus last month for a review into the acquisition of properties and the university’s governance and culture.
UL president Kerstin Mey has gone on sick leave since the controversy emerged, with the deputy president, Professor Shane Kilcommins, now acting president.
Labour TD Alan Kelly asked why the CCO, Mr Flaherty, was not present at the hearing yesterday. He was the ‘executive sponsor’ of the Rhebogue purchase who had the initial contact with the developer at the start of 2022.
PAC chair Brian Stanley pressed UL officials as to why Mr Flaherty was also absent in May last year when the university was before the committee over the purchase of the former Dunnes Stores site in Limerick City for €3million over its 2019 value.
Mr Kelly said it was ‘like an episode of Hamlet without the prince’, as it emerged Mr Flaherty was texting UL officials at the committee last year while he was absent.
‘So the prince was across the road in some establishment texting people here the last time, and the prince isn’t here this time,’ he said.
Independent TD Verona Murphy said UL’s president told the PAC last year that Mr Flaherty ‘had a longstanding engagement and wasn’t available’, adding: ‘We took that in good faith. This is a statutory committee, and the understanding for me is that that is a blatant lie.’
Prof Kilcommins said Mr Flaherty told him he would not be attending the PAC last year due to an ongoing investigation into the Rhebogue purchase after a protected disclosure was made.
‘It’s exactly as you said. It was suggested that he had a long-standing commitment, and I was surprised because I had been told differently,’ he said. ‘The chief corporate officer [Mr Flaherty] was with us the night before, the morning of and he was present also after the meeting. I’m understanding that he was texting members of the UL delegation during the meeting.’
Prof Kilcommins said he did not know whether Mr Flaherty had an engagement and had raised the matter with UL’s president afterwards.
Documents provided to the PAC by UL detail an external investigation by Niamh O’Donoghue, a former secretary-general in the Department of Social Protection, into the Rhebogue purchase.
The Comptroller and Auditor General is doing a value for money report into the purchase of the Dunnes site and the Rhebogue houses.
‘Hamlet without the prince’
‘That is a blatant lie’