Questions raised over Irish Water contract with Abtran

Questions have been raised about the awarding of the call service contract for Irish Water to Cork-based company Abtran.

Social Democrats TD Catherine Murphy said there were “obvious questions of probity” in the awarding of the contract to the company which she claimed had two “high profile failings” in previous contracts.

She said the company had failed with student grant application processing system Susi, which cost an additional €6 million. Despite this it was awarded the property tax contract and Revenue had to stop it because initially it had failed to cope.

One of the criteria for tendering is the requirement to have a turnover of €20 million for the preceding three years and because the company had a “number of lucrative State contracts prior to the Irish Water contract, the State certainly improved Abtran’s ability to meet the criteria laid down in the process”.

From Freedom of Information requests she learned that an email had been sent on February 15th, 2012, to the private secretary of then minister for environment Phil Hogan seeking a meeting with “Phil”.

Undisclosed amount

A meeting was agreed which took place on February 27th, 2012, with the person who sent the email, Mr O’Byrnes, and the co-owner of Abtran. In March 2013, Abtran was awarded the contract, worth €50 million over four years. A State investment vehicle had also invested an undisclosed amount into Abtran and Ms Murphy asked how much was involved, and for what. She noted that freedom of information cover “just falls outside the time frame for the Irish Water call centre contract by a number of weeks”.

Tánaiste Joan Burton said City of Dublin VEC was awarded the Susi contract and it arranged how it would be delivered. There were “definitely teething problems” but it “is now deemed to be one of the best new systems installed by any Irish government”. The Tánaiste said Revenue reported very high levels of compliance.

In a statement later, Irish Water said it fully complied with public sector procurement guidelines. “The contract for the operation of Irish Waters contact centre was awarded after a thorough Europe-wide public procurement process.”