The Department of Sport will not be looking forward to next week as the Public Accounts Committee grills them over the failed ‘Bertie Bowl’ sports campus.
What costs €43m but yet, doesn’t exist? Well, the ‘Bertie Bowl’ actually. This is why the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) will be asking the Department of Sport how it managed to spend €43m on something that doesn’t even exist.
But what is (or more to the point, what was) the Bertie Bowl? Back when the Celtic Tiger was on the prowl, the Government at the time (Bertie and Co.) wanted to build a 500-acre sports campus in Abbottstown, Dublin, and they were going to call it ‘Stadium Ireland’. However, the only thing that got built in the end was the National Aquatic Centre.
John McGuinness, the chairman of PAC (‘waste watchdog’), said: “It is difficult to justify €43m given nothing has actually gone ahead.
“They seem to have put the cart before the horse by spending millions and millions without having any commitment of money to implement any plan.
“There has been too much money wasted in the past without things being properly thought out.”
Well, it is Ireland after all.
When planning for the campus began back in 2002, the Government had spent €2m. However, four years later that figure somehow rose to €43m when plan after plan was revised and redrawn – with zero results.
It will be interesting to see where all the money went. No doubt it was just ‘resting in somebody’s account’.
