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The Office of Public Works (OPW) has warned it could have to reduce spending on flood protection measures if forced to foot the bill for a long-planned National Children’s Science Centre which could cost €70 million or more.
Under an arbitrator’s finding from last December, OPW must deliver the building for the project by the end of 2029. The arbitration ruling also says the project should go to tender by the end of this year.
However, OPW chairman John Conlon told the Dáil’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on Thursday that the organisation had no funding to pay for the science centre.
The committee heard that no Government department has been willing to become a sponsor for developing the project, which has been under consideration for more than 20 years. So far about €5 million in public funding has been spent on the project.
The proposed centre is currently earmarked to be located at Earlsfort Terrace in Dublin.
Comptroller and Auditor General Seamus McCarthy, who last year published a scathing report on the background to the project, said on Thursday it would fall on the OPW to pay for the National Children’s Science Centre project if no other Government department was willing to fund it.
“It has become an OPW project and partly it is of their own doing because of commitments that they signed,” McCarthy said.
Conlon said in the absence of additional funding being provided it would mean “I will have to consider reducing expenditure on things like flood schemes, which is something I would find almost impossible particularly given the climate obligations we have and the climate change and even what is happening in recent weeks”.
Conlon said he was concerned OPW could potentially also become liable to meet ongoing costs associated with the science centre even after the building was delivered.
McCarthy said there was an original agreement between OPW and the promoters of the proposed centre to provide a building on a site near Heuston Station in Dublin. However, this was abandoned following the economic crash after 2008.
In 2013 the OPW and the charity behind the project – Irish Children’s Museum Ltd (ICML) – reached a deal under which it would provide a 9,580 sq m building at Earlsfort Terrace.
“Poor cost estimates of the State’s liability in respect of the agreement were provided at different stages in the development. In May 2024, the construction cost to be borne by the State, stood at an estimated €70.4 million with the potential for further increases,” McCarthy said.
He also said the proposed project had never been evaluated or appraised in accordance with the requirements of the public spending code.
“Furthermore, we found that because no public body has emerged to act as the sponsoring agency for the project, key controls designed to safeguard public funds were not applied in respect of the science centre project.”
Under questioning from James Geoghegan of Fine Gael, ICML chief executive Barbara Galavan said under the arbitrator’s finding, OPW would have to provide a building for the project by December 2029.
Conlon said OPW was bound by this finding. However, he said he did not have a “funder for this project”.
Asked how he intended to deliver the building, Conlon said: “To be very frank at this point, I can’t do it without funding.”
“Everyone is very clear, the position I am in is either we build or breach [the arbitrator’s ruling].”
“At this stage I am not in a position where I can to make a commitment to build this in the absence of funding. That might require further negotiations with ICML or parent departments who might sponsor it. But I cannot today commit to building this without funding in place.”
Committee chairman John Brady of Sinn Féin said Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers must intervene immediately “and put an end to the waste of public money on the €70 million Children’s Science Centre shambles”.
