PADDY DUFFY, the close associate of former taoiseach Bertie Ahern, travelled to the US as a guest of Fás in 2004 and 2006, although he had no official role with the authority.
The cost of Mr Duffy's trips - one of which cost €4,562 - was charged to the Fás Science Challenge project, which spent over €600,000 on transatlantic travel for the director general of Fás, Rody Molloy, his wife and senior Fás executives in a four-year period.
As pressure grew on Mr Molloy yesterday in relation to expenditure controls at Fás, Taoiseach Brian Cowen said he knew Mr Molloy to be an excellent public servant.
"I have every confidence in him," Mr Cowen said. Fás is the national training authority and has an annual budget of €1 billion.
Mr Molloy said on radio yesterday that the expenditure was related to the Fás Science Challenge programme which links up Irish students and apprentices with top science institutes in the US, including the Nasa space centre in Florida.
Mr Molloy said a $942 game of golf at the Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress Resort in Orlando in January 2005 was part of a process of developing relationships with people in the US.
He also defended the expenditure of $410 at a beauty and nail salon in Cocoa Beach, Florida, in August 2005. "Getting into detail of the preparation of somebody for a particular event, again the amount of money in terms of the total package is very, very small," he said on RTÉ's Today with Pat Kenny show.
Fine Gael spokesman on enterprise Leo Varadkar, called on the Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Mary Coughlan to "back or sack" Mr Molloy and his board. Documents released to The Irish Times by Fás under the Freedom of Information Act show Mr Molloy travelled to the US 11 times between November 2003 and November 2007, with his wife accompanying him on five occasions. The total cost was €67,917.
The majority of the flights cost several thousand euro, with a flight for Mr Molloy to Houston in April 2007 costing €8,966.43.
In November 2007, a Fás executive and his wife flew around the world at a cost of €12,097. "The individual in question, who was at an event in Tokyo, on official business . . . then at his own expense spent some time on the way back coming back through the US," Mr Molloy said.
Mr Duffy was flown to Atlanta, Georgia, in January 2004 at a cost of €4,562. The cost of a 2006 flight for Mr Duffy paid for by Fás, this time to Florida, is not known.
Mr Duffy, who acted as an adviser to Mr Ahern up to 1999, is now a public relations consultant. He told The Irish Times he was heavily supportive in a voluntary capacity of the Science Challenge, and was invited by Fás on both trips. Fás is currently the subject of an inquiry by the Dáil Committee on Public Accounts.