Ruairi Quinn claims 2800km for 9 days at work

By
Ken Foxe

Last updated at 1:20 AM on 26th February 2012

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Pressure: Education and Skills Minister Ruairi Quinn is facing criticism over his expenses

Ruairi Quinn is under growing pressure over his expenses as we
reveal he put in a SECOND huge claim, of 2,800km – for a month in which he
worked just nine days.

Mr Quinn pocketed almost €800 after saying he had
incurred the mileage last August on official business. However his own diary
shows that he was officially on holiday for 22 days of the month –
leaving a maximum of nine working days in which to clock up the mammoth claim.

The 2,800km claim averages out at 311km per day – the
equivalent of a round trip to Waterford every single day on which he was
working.

However, Mr Quinn’s diary shows only three trips outside
of Dublin during the whole of August that, together, amount to less than
1,000km of official travel.

This leaves Mr Quinn needing to explain how he incurred
the other 1,800km.

The revelation follows last week’s exclusive report
showing that Mr Quinn claimed for 5,100kms during July, when his official diary
also showed less than 1,000km worth of trips.

Mr Quinn has since defended his mileage claims – which
earned him more than €10,000 tax-free last year on top of his salary and
allowances.

He said other officials used his car to shuttle to and
from Leinster House and insisted the detail of his claims was ‘all there for
people to see’.

Despite that assurance, however, he is once again refusing
to explain his August mileage claim or to allow the Irish Mail on Sunday to
verify his mileage claims against his car’s odometer.

Mr Quinn insists that the mileage is taken from the
odometer at the end of every month. However, he is also refusing to explain
how, if that is the case, every single reading between May and August gave a
round number, ending with either 100 or 50. There is nothing in the rules to
suggest that ministers should round up or down their mileage claims.

The revelations will heap pressure on Mr Quinn, who has
already conceded that the system for claiming mileage – which is entirely
unchecked and relies simply on ministers and their staff to submit a figure –
needs reform.

Records obtained by the MoS under Freedom of Information
laws show that on September 20 last year, Mr Quinn signed off the claim for
mileage incurred during the month of August 2011.

The form he signed states: ‘I certify that the mileage
travelled in the period from 1st August to 31st August which related to my office
as minister at the Department of Education and Skills was 2,800 kilometres.’

As per Government rules, this mileage was not checked,
nor were any of the journeys queried. The form was simply processed by
officials, who worked out that Mr Quinn should be paid €796.88. The payment was
processed on September 30 and paid by electronic transfer.

However the minister’s official diary, also obtained by
the MoS under freedom of Information, shows that he spent the vast majority of
the month on holiday. The dates from August 6 to 16 and 17 to 28 are marked in
his diary as: ‘Minister on holiday.’

This makes a total of 23 days on which he was officially
not working.

In the diary, only nine days are not listed as holidays.
The 1st, 2nd and 3rd are left blank. There are six days during the month on
which official engagements are listed. On Thursday, August 4, Mr Quinn attended
an event in NUI Maynooth, returned to Dublin for a launch at the National
Museum, then went back to Maynooth, where he stayed overnight.

He spent half the next day at the university before
returning to Dublin.

On August 17 – the day the Leaving Cert results were
issued – Mr Quinn interrupted his holidays to meet students at Clifden
Community College in Co. Galway at 11am.

The minister expressed his worry over poor results in
maths, saying: ‘It does concern me. We have a problem here.’

Coincidentally, the Quinn family have a holiday home in
Connemara although it is not known whether the minister was holidaying there at
the time.

Mr Quinn returned to work on Monday August 29, when his
day began with an interview at RTÉ before lunch at Chez Max restaurant in the
city. He then met staff at his department on Marlborough Street. The following
day, August 30, he was in the Dáil by 8am for a radio interview with Morning
Ireland ahead of that day’s Labour ministers’ meeting and Cabinet meeting. He
then travelled to his departmental offices where he had meetings with his
secretary general and other staff.

On August 31, he was at his desk at 9.15am and had a series
of meetings and other events in the department, finishing at 4.30pm.

An estimate of the journeys involved in the events listed
in the diary suggests that they would amount to considerably less than 1,000km
– even including a round trip from Dublin to Clifden.

The MoS asked the minister’s press office if he could
account for the other 1,800km he had claimed – and for which he had received
taxpayers’ money.

We also asked a series of other questions about his
mileage claims, including:

How, if the mileage was read from the odometer at the
end of each month, did all his claims end in round numbers?
Who were the officials he said also used his car and
were there lists of the trips he said they had taken?
Could the MoS see the odometer?
Did he use the car to attend the Labour Party think-in
in September?
Could we see his mileage claims for September,
November, December and January?
What were the lease arrangements for the car?

The press office replied late last week saying: ‘You will
recall from my previous responses that the electronic diary maintained by the
minister’s office does not reflect all official use of the minister’s car. An
itemised list of all car journeys is not available.

‘I wish to reaffirm that no further relevant records
exist.

‘Queries in relation to the rules governing the mileage
system for ministers should be directed to the Department of Public Expenditure
and Reform.

‘In relation to your requests for information about the
minister’s car and mileage claims, you may make such a request for this
information by writing to the department’s FoI Unit, enclosing the relevant
fee. We have no further comment to make on this issue.’

The statement was in stark contrast to Mr Quinn’s public
comments this week when questioned about the mileage controversy.

In an interview with George Hook on Newstalk, he brushed
off the controversy and said: ‘It’s all there for people to see if they want.’

However, it is clear now that no such records are kept by
which the mileage can be independently or retrospectively vouched or checked.

A claim form is simply submitted to the accounting
officer, specifying how many kilometres have been travelled in that month.

Money is then paid once the form has been signed
personally by both the driver and by the minister who is making the claim.

No photographic evidence of the car’s odometer or
declarations of what journeys were made and why is sought, as would happen in
normal work places.

In the seven months of last year during which Mr Quinn
made mileage claims, the amount paid out to him was €10,966, a tax-free sum.

The cost of his two drivers is also paid by his
department, following the Government decision to remove state cars from all but
three ministers.

In the period between May 3 and August 31, Mr Quinn
claimed €6,749 for 16,800km with the first 5,000km paid at a higher rate of 59c
per km.

From September 1 until the end of the year, he claimed
another €4,217, with around 15,000km marked as official business, paid at a
lower rate of 28.4 cent.

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5 questions Mr Quinn still won’t answer

How many kilometres – and how
much money – was claimed for
each of the months of September, October, November and December 2011?
How is it that the minister’s
mileage claims always end on a round number rather than the random number that
could be expected in most cases?
Is it appropriate for officials from the Department of Education to use the
ministerial car and for Mr Quinn then to claim mileage back for himself?
Could the minister supply more details of the odometer readings or photographic
evidence of the odometer readings that have been kept?
Has the minister ever used his ministerial car for party political reasons, and
could that be classified as ‘related
to … [the] office as minister’?

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Will he face a probe?

With no sign of the political classes questioning Mr
Quinn’s mileage claims, he may escape scrutiny unless a member of the public
complains.

A code of conduct for ministers says those provided with
‘facilities at public expense’ must use them in a way that guarantees ‘public
value for money’. But the watchdog, the Standards in Public Office Commission,
could only investigate if they were to receive a complaint alleging a possible
breach of the code.

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Why is his mileage always a round number?

The Department of Education has refused to explain why
all of Ruairi Quinn’s mileage claims end in round numbers.

Mr Quinn said last week that mileage was claimed by a
driver using the odometer to calculate the total distance travelled by his car
every month.

Speaking on RTÉ, he said: ‘There isn’t a trip by trip
measurement. All the car mileage is measured at the outset of the month and at
the end of the month.’

A department spokeswoman confirmed: ‘These claims are
based on odometer readings taken by the minister’s driver on a monthly basis.’

Yet all four of Mr Quinn’s claims from May to August are
for perfectly round numbers of kilometres, ending in either 50 or 100.

In May, Mr Quinn claimed he had driven precisely 4,650km;
in June, exactly 4,250km; in July, 5,100kms; and then in August, 2,800km. On
foot of these claims he was paid €6,751.45, tax-free, into his bank account.

However, Mr Quinn this weekend refused to comment on the
extraordinary coincidence that his odometer would finish on such an exact figure
every month.

In his interviews on the subject last week, the minister
did not suggest at any point that the figures he had claimed were rounded up or
down.

And there is no provision in the expenses rules for
monthly mileage to be rounded to the nearest 50km: instead, the form simply
asks for the total mileage incurred on official duties.

By contrast, his junior minister, Ciarán Cannon, made
mileage claims between March and September of 11,428km, 9,090km, 5,609km and
9,588km.

Mr Quinn has also refused to expand on his claims that
much of his mystery mileage was run up by officials using his car to travel the
2.5km between the Dáil and his Marlborough Street office.

He told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland: ‘If I go from the
department to Leinster House, I would send the car back to bring them
[officials] across, because it is not within walking distance.’

To explain away the contentious 4,200km of his July
claim, 1,680 such trips would have to have been made.

The Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, when asked
whether it was appropriate to claim mileage for trips made by other people,
pointed to 1983 guidelines for ministerial travel. However, the guidelines
provide no detail on what can and cannot be claimed as ‘official business’.

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The money you got for mileage would keep my kids warm,
says mother who was moved to fury

By ALISON O’REILLY

A struggling single mother
of two has hit out at Ruairi Quinn over his unexplained €1,400 July mileage
claim, saying the money would be enough to ‘stop my children waking up in a
freezing house’.

Sharon Thomas emailed Mr Quinn – and every other TD – to
point out that his contentious claim would pay for the full tank of home
heating oil she cannot afford.

Struggle: The Thomas family: Erin, left, and Callum and, right, mother Sharon

She challenged Mr Quinn to justify the taxpayers’ money
he claimed, saying: ‘In light of the savage cuts being forced upon the people
of this country by yours and other Government departments, explain publicly how
such a figure is justified.

‘If indeed you are within the letter of the law in
claiming these expenses, perhaps you would also agree that they are
unjustifiable and would commit to demanding an overhaul of the system so that
payments… reflect a true representation of the costs involved.’

Sharon, 39, who has been in receipt of the lone parent’s
allowance for the past four years, suffers with fibromyalgia – a condition
causing chronic fatigue and widespread pain.

A former benefit fraud investigator, Sharon says she had
never written to a politician before but was incensed by the MoS’ revelations
about the giant unvouched claim.

‘I was so outraged when I read the story about his
expenses, I just felt I had to write and complain. It’s something I’ve never
done before,’ she said.

‘Thank God I have a medical card because my medication
costs €250 a month. Not only am I struggling to survive on €249 a week, I’m
also dreading an imminent rent review.

‘I’m paying €49 a week towards my rent and living week to
week with two school-going children to take care of.

‘Our back to school allowance has been cut, the rent
review is on the way and I’m totally broke. Yet Ruairi Quinn is getting huge
amounts of money and not explaining what he’s doing with it.’ She told Mr
Quinn: ‘€1,451 would afford us a full tank of heating oil so that my kids would
not have to leave the house cold every morning going to school.

‘It would also cover the cost of the ballet lessons my
daughter so desperately wants. It would mean my son needn’t have given up the
karate lessons he so enjoyed but I could no longer afford.’

Sharon sent her email on Monday but is still awaiting a
response from Mr Quinn.

‘I won’t hold my breath,’ she said.

‘I got an automated response to say the email was
received but I doubt if he’ll get back to me because he isn’t going to explain
what that money was for.’

Sharon has been living alone with her children, Callum,
seven, and four-year-old Erin the past four years since her relationship broke
down and she returned home from Britain.

She said: ‘There is still the mentality that women love
being single mothers and are out partying five nights a week. The last time I
went out socially was January and before that it was May. I have no life and I
have to watch every penny.

‘I give my children good food but I have to watch the
prices all the time because items keeping going up.

‘We believed this Government would bring change. How
wrong was that?’

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Ruairi Quinn claims 2800km for 9 days at work

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