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Irish Times
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
Former Arts Council director Maureen Kennelly: ‘The Minister saw the opportunity for a scalp. I was an easy target'
THE BOTCHED IT PROJECT 'None of us set out with the intention of this happening. It is deeply regrettable. There's been lots of indignation and outrage about this, but I wouldn't want that to obscure the fact that the arts sector is populated with people – and the Arts Council as well – who are highly dedicated, very responsible and committed to delivering value for money for the public.' This is the view of Maureen Kennelly , who left her role as director of the Arts Council this month, and is speaking about the organisation's disastrous IT project, which ended with a multimillion-euro write-off and no software system to show for it. The idea was to bring together five existing systems, including those dealing with grants. The original budget for the project was €2.97 million, for delivery in 2021. That rose to €6.5 million by the time the plug was pulled, in June 2024. The net loss was €5.3 million. The Department of Culture, which oversees the council, has acknowledged its mistakes since details of the fiasco emerged in February, but the repercussions are being felt mainly at the council, where Kennelly has been jettisoned after a single term. Patrick O'Donovan , who took over as Minister for Culture from Catherine Martin in January, vetoed a unanimous board decision to renew Kennelly's contract. READ MORE Entrance: Patrick O'Donovan became Minister for Culture in January. Photograph: Sam Boal/Collins 'From the outset of all this, in early February, the Minister's reaction to the write-off of spending on the IT system set the tone for wider media commentary and political response,' Kennelly says. 'The board of the Arts Council was fully satisfied with my role in the project and made the recommendation to the Minister to renew me for a further five-year term. 'They were confident that the Niamh Brennan review' – of the council's governance and culture, which O'Donovan commissioned in February and is expected this autumn – 'would accurately describe the development of the project and my role in it, trying to rescue it. It is important for me to say that I inherited this project. The project had started well before my time, and it was conceived and initiated on a very shaky foundation. 'I led the bid to rescue it to the point where it was ultimately decided by the board, in conjunction with me, to stop the project in favour of an option which would be cheaper in the long run' – an off-the-shelf rather than custom system. 'Unfortunately, the Minister decided not to wait for the outcome of the Niamh Brennan review. He judged me before those findings are available and against the clear advice of the Arts Council board. His actions have served to discredit the Arts Council and, in particular, my reputation. It is clear to me that he saw the opportunity for a scalp and I was a very easy target.' The IT project had 'troubled origins', she says, because 'the senior expertise simply was never there to deliver it, and the oversight from the department and the OGCIO' – Office of the Government Chief Information Officer – 'was never in place'. 'This was one outlying project which failed, there's no doubt. But it absolutely should not overshadow all the work the Arts Council does. And the Arts Council is by no means alone in enduring difficulties with such a project.' Kennelly chose to remain at the organisation until the conclusion of two Oireachtas committee hearings into the debacle – 'I thought it was very important for the Arts Council to be accountable' – and left two days later, on Friday, June 13th. One of the hearings was of the joint Oireachtas Committee on Arts, Media, Communications, Culture and Sport, where the Sinn Féin TD Joanna Byrne described Kennelly as having been 'thrown under the bus by the Minister'. THE BACKGROUND In 2018-19, with the council's core computer system on its last legs, the organisation's previous director initiated a huge 'business transformation project' with the approval of the Department of Culture. The IT project was complex, seeking to merge grant-management and financial systems, among others. As Ireland's national Government agency for funding, developing and promoting the arts, it has a large brief and hundreds of clients, from big organisations to individual artists. It was clear at the committee hearings that neither the council nor the department had the senior IT wherewithal to adequately manage or assess this, and relied on external contractors and project managers, where frequent staff changes added to the problem. The project ran behind from early on; specifications were altered after the business case was made. Issues and delays over the system's analysis, design and development had knock-on effects for timelines and budget. Covid happened. As the IT project progressed, Kennelly sought departmental approval several times to hire a senior in-house information-technology specialist. The department said it could not approve recruiting at the proposed level of Civil Service principal officer (current salary range: €105,000-€130,000). Two senior IT professionals were eventually hired in April-May 2024, at the assistant-principal-higher grade (€88,500-€110,500). 'Unfortunately it came too late in the day. We had halted the project at that stage,' Kennelly says. With hindsight it would doubtless have been better to stop sooner. 'They were torturous decisions along the way,' Kennelly says. 'Because your desire is to protect the initial investment. The last thing you want is to be writing off significant funds. I know from my own very deep past in the arts sector how precious those monies are.' Blinder: Maureen Kennelly with Catherine Martin in 2022, when the TD was minister for culture. Photograph: Maxwell's She was appointed at the height of the pandemic, a period when the arts sector was battling for survival. The council, which Kennelly led with its chairman, Kevin Rafter, and the department, led by Catherine Martin, as minister, and Katherine Licken, its secretary general at the time, are regarded as having played a blinder, securing extra funding to keep the arts afloat through lockdown. Last year the council's programmes, partnerships and grant aid supported 588 organisations and 2,000 individuals, 140 festivals, 318 schools and 31 local authorities. After years of underfunding, the council's annual budget increased by 75 per cent between 2020 and 2024, to €140 million, effectively holding on to Covid-response increases. Its remit expanded, grant applications rose from 3,000 to 8,666, and the council funded more individuals and organisations. All that takes more work; the department says that its approved staffing level for the council increased from 47 in 2018 to 146 in 2024. Ticking away in the background was this complex, ballooning IT project. It has all been detailed in the report of the department's internal examination , in media reports and at the Oireachtas hearings: the Public Accounts Committee on May 29th and Culture Committee on June 11th. And in parallel with Brennan's report, the department is reviewing its own governance and oversight. As the project's expected delivery approached – a year late, in September 2022 – multiple bugs were discovered. This was substandard work, Kennelly told the Public Accounts Committee. 'The really serious nature of the situation was clear to me,' she says. The council went into dispute with contractors, and Kennelly restructured the project, changing internal personnel and stopping payments to contractors. 'With hindsight, I'm not sure any other CEO would have done any differently, to be honest.' She continued to 'really earnestly' appeal for sanction for a senior IT person. THE ACCOUNTING Before the Oireachtas committees, Kennelly and Feargal Ó Coigligh , Licken's successor as secretary general, sought to be 'completely transparent in relation to our failings'. A key factor that emerged at the Culture Committee is that although the council kept the department informed, the problems that developed appear not to have been escalated within the department, up to the secretary general or the minister, until late June 2024. 'It was surprising to me that it wasn't being conveyed upwards,' Kennelly says. 'We weren't keeping a single thing hidden from the department.' Asked in committee how much correspondence she had with the department about the project, she estimated 'about 60 pieces of written communication' – a number Ó Coigligh initially questioned at the Culture Committee but then accepted. At committee, he also acknowledged departmental failure. 'We should have stepped in much earlier when it became clear this project had run into serious difficulty.' Twenty-one external expert contractors have been paid; 75 per cent of the costs relate to four companies. The council has started legal proceedings against two of them (Codec, one of the contractors involved, strongly rejects claims its work was substandard) and is in pre-action with two others. The legal action has cost €60,000 so far, but the department has now frozen spending, pending recently sought feedback from the Attorney General's office. 'I hope the Minister's decision to pause spending on it will not squander a good opportunity to recover monies on behalf of the public,' Kennelly says. 'It wasn't, 'Let's just lash loads of money at the lawyers and get this fixed.' It was being constructed extremely carefully.' 'Furious': Patrick O'Donovan and Simon Harris. Photograph: Brian Lawless/PA Wire O'Donovan was 'desperately angry' when he was told about the €5.3 million write-off, and immediately took it to the Cabinet; there was, perhaps, the slight air of a new sheriff wanting to clean up Dodge. Coming on foot of other sagas involving wasted public money, fury erupted . Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers decried 'a massive waste of money'. Tánaiste Simon Harris was 'furious'. (Then, this month, O'Donovan was admonished for bringing 'substantial expenditure' issues, including the Arts Council, to Cabinet 'under the arm', without telling colleagues in advance.) When the Minister declined to renew Kennelly's contract, the council instead proposed deferring a decision until after Brennan's report. The department's only offer was a 'final contract' of up to nine months or 'until a new director is appointed, whichever is sooner'. It was 'highly conditioned', Kennelly says. 'I think any self-respecting senior executive would have thought twice about it.' She declined. 'It's just disappointing that my only encounter with the Minister was about this, and that he appears to have rushed to such hasty judgment on this outlying project when there are so many other fantastic things being delivered by the Arts Council,' Kennelly says. THE MEDIA COVERAGE The Minister told the Sunday Independent last weekend, 'I made the decision that I think is in the best interest of the Arts Council and the taxpayer.' Kennelly is 'flabbergasted by this. He made the decision against the clear advice of the Arts Council, and I would like him to explain how this decision meets the best interest of the taxpayer and the Arts Council. 'I find his statement deeply insulting and damaging to my reputation. I hope that he'll have an opportunity to explain why he made that statement at the joint Oireachtas committee' when it convenes on July 2nd. She says the council was dismayed by details in an Irish Times report in April based on information released following a Freedom of Information request. It referred to a meeting that the new Minister called with Kennelly and Maura McGrath – Rafter's successor as chair – two months earlier. O'Donovan asked if they or their predecessors had discussed the business transformation project with the previous minister or secretary general, 'to which both replied 'No'', according to minutes the department supplied. But Kennelly's own note of her full reply is, 'No, but I kept the principal officer, my designated line of contact, informed right throughout the project.' 'I was flabbergasted,' Kennelly says. 'It was an extremely selective record of the meeting. The department should never have sent minutes to The Irish Times without checking them with us first. It was an extremely unfair reflection of the whole situation.' She adds, 'It appears they may have been put out there to justify the Minister's actions.' Culture Committee: Feargal Ó Coigligh answers questions on June 11th. Photograph: Oireachtas TV Several members of the Culture Committee, including Malcolm Byrne of Fianna Fáil, repeatedly asked the secretary general whether he advised the Minister about Kennelly's contract. Ó Coigligh repeated, several times, that it was a ministerial decision, effectively refusing to answer the question. THE LESSONS 'It's a huge regret of mine' that the IT project wasn't delivered, Kennelly says, 'and that the circumstances of my contract mean I'm not there to see a new system through. I hope and I trust good decisions will be made in the future.' The lessons to be learned include ensuring appropriate internal expertise is in place, alongside departmental and OGCIO oversight. 'The Arts Council is set up to develop the arts and to support artists and organisations. It's not set up as an IT specialist ... The risks of the project weren't properly assessed from the start.' If they had been, someone would perhaps have said, 'This is a project that's doomed to fail ... You were absolutely not set up to take this on.' At the Culture Committee hearing Joanna Byrne said, 'I am of the view that there was full transparency at every stage, from 2021 right up to 2024, on the part of the Arts Council. Yet it is okay for the department to state that it failed but that nobody within it is to blame ... Thousands of artists in this country are not getting the service they desire and deserve because of the failures in the department. I do not think it cuts the mustard to state that the department failed but that nobody was held accountable.' Kennelly says now, 'It seems probable to me that someone was briefing against the Arts Council and against me, and I find that abhorrent.' Is she bitter about all that has happened? 'No. I'm disappointed. It's been a very tumultuous time. I loved the role, and have huge regard for the people in the Arts Council, and equally huge regard for people in the sector. The Arts Council's an enormously important part of Irish life. It has to be protected, and funding for the arts has to be protected. That's absolutely critical.'
Irish Times
20-06-2025
- Business
- Irish Times
Arts Council stopped three times from spending money on outside partners after botched IT project
The Arts Council was forced to stop spending money with an external partner for a third time in the aftermath of a botched €6.7 million IT project. Minister for Culture Patrick O'Donovan had previously told it to discontinue spending on legal cases pursuing some of the companies involved in the ill-fated project, and it was forced in March to pull a tender for PR advice in advance of Oireachtas grillings on the matter. Now, internal documents seen by The Irish Times show that it was last month also told to stop spending with an external firm of consultants on governance advice. In an email sent on May 21st this year, the department's secretary general Feargal Ó Coigligh reminded Arts Council chair Maura McGrath that the body had been told not to spend on services outside of its routine operational requirements. READ MORE It arose, he wrote, after Ms McGrath told a senior official in the department that a company had been engaged 'in respect of the appearance by the Arts Council at the Public Accounts Committee'. Mr Ó Coigligh demanded a report on the spending with the firm and why it was being undertaken. In response, Ms McGrath said the work being done by the firm did not contravene the earlier order from Mr O'Donovan, and forwarded an email from the firm concerned. It outlined that it was providing assistance in preparing the Arts Council delegation to 'understand and be in a position to fully discharge their statutory and code of practice related accountability obligations during the forthcoming appearance at PAC and JOC [Joint Oireachtas Committee]'. The email outlined that the firm did not provide PR or public affairs advice but instead focused on assisting clients 'understand and properly discharge their governance functions'. Despite several references in the emails to upcoming Oireachtas committee hearings, a spokeswoman for the Arts Council told The Irish Times that preparation was 'managed internally' and said that 'no company, including the one referred to, was engaging in work relating to committees prep'. She said the firm was engaged to supply advice to the Arts Council board and that 'professional services to the board are a separate matter'. The Arts Council outlined that the advice was coming under a pre-existing contract that was run in January 2024. Responding, Mr Ó Coigligh told the Arts Council chair that even though the firm was not providing public affairs or PR advice, he considered 'the work being carried out ... falls outside the routine operational requirements' and no further liability 'should be matured under this contract'. The Arts Council spokeswoman said it is 'confident in its compliance' with directions from the Minister. No further services have been drawn down under the contract since, she said. Elsewhere, the Arts Council has said that its former chair Maureen Kennelly declared a conflict of interest in 2023 when a publisher that released a book of short stories authored by her husband successfully applied for an €80,000 grant from the State agency. The publisher, Doire Press, was awarded the sum in the same year that it published Night Music by Fergus Cronin. A spokeswoman for the Arts Council said: 'In relation to all staff members, including members of the executive, a robust conflict of interest process is also in place. With 8,600 applications received each year, and the many connections that could arise therefore, this is a very necessary part of Arts Council process. A conflict of interest was declared for the Arts Grant Funding application of Doire Press for 2023 by Maureen Kennelly during the decision-making process.'
Irish Times
20-06-2025
- Politics
- Irish Times
Patrick O'Donovan admonished for bringing ‘substantial' issues to Cabinet without telling colleagues
Minister for Culture Patrick O'Donovan was admonished by Department of Public Expenditure officials for bringing 'substantial expenditure' issues such as the failed Arts Council IT project to Cabinet without sharing details with colleagues in advance. A senior official in Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers's department complained that, under Government procedures, such important policy issues should be flagged and seen 'well before' these are considered by Ministers. Marianne Cassidy, an assistant secretary at the department, said this was the second time Mr O'Donovan brought a major item to Cabinet 'under the arm', meaning it was not shared in advance with other colleagues. The abandoned project, which led to more than €5.3 million being written off by the State , first came to light in February when Mr O'Donovan brought a memo on the matter to Cabinet. He was only weeks into his new role as a senior minister, and it soon emerged that his predecessor, Catherine Martin , was aware of the matter since summer last year. READ MORE The Department of Public Expenditure became aware of Mr O'Donovan's intention to bring the issue to Cabinet five days before this occurred. On Friday, February 7th, Ms Cassidy wrote to the Department of Culture to say her team understood Mr O'Donovan's memo 'will bring serious issues to the attention of Government'. She said the Department of Public Expenditure still had not seen the memo or been made aware of its detail, despite it appearing that these issues had been under consideration by the Department of Culture 'for a while'. 'As a result, it will not be possible to consider them and advise our Minister in relation to them,' said the letter, released under Freedom of Information laws. The letter noted Mr O'Donovan's proposal to spend €10 million bringing an NFL American football game to Croke Park in September had also gone to Cabinet that same week 'under the arm'. It said this practice 'makes it very difficult for this department, and indeed for Government generally, to thoroughly and properly consider issues and their implications, particularly regarding substantial expenditure implications and serious governance issues'. 'This Department should be allowed time, in compliance with government procedures, to properly scrutinise important policy issues ... well before they are table [sic] for consideration by Government,' it said. The Office of the Government Chief Information Officer at the Department of Public Expenditure had been liaising with the Arts Council throughout the project. At one point, this office had raised concerns that a key person involved in the project seemed to have 'little to no relevant expertise in this particular area'. In a statement, Mr O'Donovan's department said in the case of the NFL and the Arts Council issues 'there were time pressures involved which required the issues to be brought to Government at short notice'. Codec, the international IT company, has confirmed to The Irish Times it is one of four contractors now facing legal action initiated by the Arts Council over the botched project , which led to €6.75 million being spent on a new grant processing system that never materialised. The firm has strongly rejected an Arts Council briefing paper, shared under Freedom of Information laws, that alleged Codec did 'substandard' work on the project and was 'difficult' to engage with. Codec, one of the main contractors, has defended its work on the project. It said it 'fully delivered' on the scope and deliverables and built a system that was 'high quality, fully functioning according to spec'. 'Codec denies that it has any liability to the Arts Council for any alleged losses which the Arts Council claims it may have suffered,' the company said. It said it has received a notice of intent from the Arts Council to commence arbitration and has confirmed its intention to participate. 'Despite several requests, the Arts Council has been unwilling to provide Codec with the report prepared by an auditor examining the project on its behalf,' it also said. An Arts Council spokeswoman said it has 'commenced proceedings against two companies and we are in pre-action stage with two further companies'.
Irish Times
11-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
Arts Council wrote to officials almost 60 times over botched IT project without issue being escalated
The Arts Council wrote to officials almost 60 times about a botched €6.75 million IT project without the issue being escalated to a senior level within the Department of Culture , an Oireachtas committee has heard. The Oireachtas arts and media committee was hearing from Arts Council leadership and senior officials in the department on Wednesday. Maureen Kennelly , the director of the council who has announced she is leaving the organisation , said she found her dealings with the department over providing staffing resources for the project 'very disappointing and frustrating'. She told committee chair, Labour TD Alan Kelly, that she felt let down by the experience. READ MORE She said the principal officer she dealt with in the department at the time was 'encouraging and reassuring' when the council updated her about the 'twists and turns' in the saga, which lasted several years and culminated in the abandonment of the project. However, Ms Kennelly said she had 'no idea' the issue wasn't being escalated and it came as a great surprise to her when she found this out. Following Ms Kennelly's contribution, the department's secretary general Feargal Ó Coigligh appeared to dispute the number of contacts made with the department, only for Ms Kennelly to reassert that it was 'just short of 60'. Mr Ó Coigligh said it was a failure on behalf of the department that the matter wasn't escalated. 'We were probably being over-supportive rather than challenging,' he told the committee. Department of Culture secretary general Feargal Ó Coigligh appearing before the Oireachtas arts and media committee. Photograph: Oireachtas TV Mr Kelly later told the secretary general that the failure to escalate the issue suggested the department was 'totally and utterly dysfunctional'. Mr Ó Coigligh said he did not agree with this. The committee was also told the department has instructed the council to stop spending money on legal cases it has taken seeking to recoup some of the lost investment. The body has initiated legal proceedings against two of the 21 contractors involved in the project, Codec and Expleo, and is in pre-action engagement with another two. The committee was told €60,000 has been spent on these actions so far. However, Mr Ó Coigligh said the department had instructed the council that there should be no further expenditure on the legal cases until a recently-commenced engagement with the Attorney General's office on the matter had concluded. The committee heard that the instruction was given after an appearance at the Public Accounts Committee at the end of last month where the spending was discussed. Mr Ó Coigligh was repeatedly asked by Fine Gael Senator Garret Ahearn whether the department was supportive of the cases being taken and if any officials had raised concerns about the potential costs of the legal cases. 'What we have said is that the Arts Council should not incur any further costs on legal action' pending the view of the Attorney General, he said. Later, Ms Kennelly said the council had been 'very much' encouraged by senior officials to try to recover money spent on the project. Outgoing Arts Council director Maureen Kennelly at the Oireachtas Arts and Media committee. Photo: Oireachtas TV Sinn Féin TD for Louth Joanna Byrne said Ms Kennelly had been 'thrown under the bus' when she was not offered a new term as Arts Council director. Mr Kelly said she had been offered up as a 'sacrificial lamb' in the wake of the controversy over the IT project, adding that he felt a 'great degree of concern about what has transpired here'. She told the committee that she was disappointed not to be given a second five-year term and would have liked to have stayed on. Asked if she felt Minister for Culture Patrick O'Donovan had confidence in her, she said her employer was the Arts Council board and she felt she had its confidence and that of her colleagues. Arts Council chair Maura McGrath confirmed that the board had recommended a new five-year term for Ms Kennelly. The council had sought a second term for Ms Kennelly and when that wasn't forthcoming, they asked for the decision to be deferred until a review into the spending controversy was complete. However, the committee was told that, ultimately, Mr O'Donovan offered a nine-month extension which was 'heavily conditioned' in that it would only be in place until a replacement was found. 'I felt it was unacceptable,' Ms Kennelly said.
CTV News
02-06-2025
- Business
- CTV News
Gallant Commission: Over 1,800 contracts awarded on the sidelines of SAAQclic project
The Gallant Commission is investigating the events that led to the SAAQclic fiasco. (Christinne Muschi/The Canadian Press) Over 1,800 contracts have been signed as part of the Société de l'assurance automobile du Québec (SAAQ)'s digital transformation, excluding the main contract signed with the consortium. This was revealed on Monday morning at the Gallant Commission, which is investigating the failures of the Crown corporation's IT project, known as the Carrefour des services affaires (CASA) and encompassing the SAAQclic platform. A lawyer for the commission, Charlotte Deslauriers-Goulet, presented the contractual timeline behind the SAAQ's technological modernization. She indicated that at least 1,879 contracts, which she describes as 'satellite' contracts, have been signed over the past 10 years. These are 'all contracts that are evolving or have evolved on the periphery' of the $458.4-million framework contract signed in 2017 with the alliance formed by SAP (owned by IBM) and LGS, said Deslauriers-Goulet. The list may include strategic consulting mandates awarded in 2015, before the tender process was launched, as well as technical support during the project's development. 'Some of these satellite contracts were concluded fairly recently. This is because they include contracts aimed at ensuring that CASA eventually comes into being or that help to rectify the problematic situation that arose when the online platform was launched, which the media have dubbed the 'SAAQclic fiasco,'' said the lawyer. The commission does not yet know the total value of these 'satellite' contracts, which are in addition to the initial budget of $458.4 million and the additional expenses of $153.7 million related to the contract with the alliance. 'But we know that we are talking about a considerable amount,' said Deslauriers-Goulet. The commission is continuing to analyze this list of contracts, which was provided by the SAAQ itself. The commission has also been unable to identify 'with certainty' all the co-contractors involved, but some have dealt directly with members of the consortium, said Deslauriers-Goulet. It should be noted that the SAAQ's technological modernization project could cost at least $1.1 billion by 2027, which is $500 million more than expected, according to the Auditor General's (AG) calculations. It is possible that the AG took some of these 'satellite contracts' into account in its estimate, but without knowing their number. This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on June 2, 2025. By Frédéric Lacroix-Couture, The Canadian Press
