The plant hire firms of TDs Mattie McGrath and Danny Healy-Rae have received contracts from Uisce Éireann worth €2.2 million and €25.7 million respectively since 2015

by rossitheking

26 comments

  3. Is this the sort of grubby gombeen deal Martin & Harris promised Lowery?

  4. The bridge over the river in Ardfinnan has been restricted to one way via “temporary” traffic lights as it needs an upgrade of some sort. For more than 10 fucking years. Mattie McGrath lives less than 10 minutes from it. He sure isn’t putting any effort into getting that sorted whatever the fuck else he has been doing.

  8. ‘While Deputy McGrath was initially supportive of Irish Water in 2014, urging compliance with water charges in an interview with Tipp FM, he has since become a critic, particularly in regard to persistent water supply issues in South Tipperary.

    He accused Uisce Éireann of “vandalising” Clonmel’s water supply in February of this year.’

    There’s something in the water in Tipperary alright….

  9. Why is this allowed?

    Is this not an obvious and blatant conflict of interest?

  10. Independents are a scourge.

    If I could change one thing about how our parliament works, I’d mandate that in order to take seats, a TD needs to be part of a party that got 2% of the national vote.

    It’s too easy to buy off one person who has no party structure to be held somewhat *accountable* maybe to.

    Peak gombeen behavior.

  13. Small beans. The council also hires them for routine work year round and for emergencies after storms and floods.

  14. Was talking to a saleman who had to call in to the Healy-Raes as part of his job a while back to arrange a delivery and he was saying one of the hardest things he ever had to do was to keep a straight face throughout when two members of the family were bitching and moaning about the price of what his company was providing, even though the price had been fully agreed beforehand and it was not remotely a large amount at all.

  15. Jobs for the boys is an art form that Fine Gael and Fianna Fail have perfected.

  16. We don’t elect good people in this country. We elect gombeens (dimmy fooly), shysters (Ahern) cutehoors (really hays), convicted criminals (lowry), thieves (O Snodaigh), clowns (all of the above and most of the rest), tax evaders (Wallace). Insurance scammers (swing gate). Horrible horrible people. We need to do better.

  17. Unfortunately nothing new. The Healy-Rae brothers have been taking government money for decades.

    Even if the tender process is legitimate (and it almost certainly is), there is a blatant conflict of interest with TD’s (or family/companies associated with them) securing these contracts. It should be banned outright.

  20. We need a cull. This makes me so mad when we don’t even have enough houses for people to live in or enough school places for kids with special needs, or enough hospital staff and beds… when the same fat cats just get richer and richer. They have no shame.

  22. The article has no evidence of wrongdoing, or any abnormalities in the tendering process.

    Imo, there’s nothing here.

    Now, if there was an article on political parties buying properties, which are then rented out to their TDs as constituency offices, and expensed to the taxpayer, I’d bite.

  23. Privatisation is such a fucking farce, unreal these haven’t been turned into Worker Co-Ops already.

  26. This is how FFG have been doing business for 30 years! The speaking rights debate is long overdue, the government has been making illegal unwritten plan for government agreements  after elections with independents like the Healy Rae’s, McGrath and Lowery for support in exchange for stuff like this. Yet those independents get to go home claiming they’re opposition that gets work done for their constituents, but really it’s just corrupt grat at the countries expense. 

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