Kildare Wicklow ETB Board not told legal firm was advising chair and vice-chair for two months

An investigation into an €83,000 bill from a legal firm to the Kildare and Wicklow Education Training Board (KWETB) has found that the firm was advising the chairman and vice-chairman of the education provider for more than two months before the board was told about it.

A sub-committee of the board of KWETB was asked to investigate the bill for the legal firm, Philip Lee Solicitors, which was paid last Christmas, in circumstances which troubled many members of the board.  

That sub-committee, comprising of board members Réada Cronin, John Hurley and John McDonagh discovered that last July 13,  the then chairman, Cllr. Jim Ruttle, vice-chair Cllr. Brendan Weld (also a previous chair) and Chair of the KWETB’s Audit Committee, Dr. Tony Lenehan were strongly advised to get legal advice at a meeting with the Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG). (The KWETB’s Audit Committee is responsible for the oversight of the organisation’s accounting procedures.)

The C&AG expressed serious concerns to them about the KWETB’s 2015 accounts, and on July 14, with the support of administration staff at KWETB, Philip Lee Solicitors was chosen by the three men.

However, in their report to a meeting of the KWETB board yesterday, Tuesday, May 8, the sub-committee reported that no contract or letter of agreement was drawn up by either the three men or Philip Lee Solicitors when they met, which would have been normal in cases where the KWETB hires outside advisors.

The sub-committee has found evidence that during that time Philip Lee regularly urged the three men to inform the board, but it took until September 27 of last year, more than two months later, before the board was finally told about the legal advice being given and the reasons it was sought.

The sub-committee reported six separate occasions when Philip Lee advised that the board be told. They also discovered evidence of disquiet about the cost of engaging Philip Lee, and confusion and disagreement over who had responsibility to appoint legal advisers.

On September 14, Dr Lenehan was concerned about the legal bill and instructed Philip Lee that no further work was to be undertaken by the legal firm and no further costs were to be incurred. He also wrote to Cllrs Ruttle and Weld, requesting that they discontinue using Philip Lee’s services.

The following day Cllrs Ruttle and Weld met Department of Education and Science officials who told them that the Minister for Education and Science intended to appoint an investigator to look into the 2015 accounts and strongly urged them to get legal advice. When Cllr Ruttle raised the matter of ongoing legal costs, officials replied that “where public money of this magnitude is at stake, legal costs will not be an issue”.

The then chairman Cllr Jim Ruttle

Later, on October 18, the KWETB was assured that legal costs would be covered by Irish Public Bodies insurance policy, and a different legal firm, Poe Kiely Hogan Lanigan, was engaged by management staff at the KWETB.

According to the report, the KWETB’s Director of Organisation, Support and Development, Joe Kelly, told Cllr Ruttle that a new legal firm was in place and to stop using Philip Lee, but Cllr Ruttle responded by telling Mr Kelly that the KWETB management should not appoint an alternative legal firm without board approval.

The then Chief Executive Sean Ashe wrote to Cllr Ruttle telling him that engaging legal advice is an ‘executive function’ (ie, a responsibility for management, rather than the board) and that he had told Philip Lee that they are not the appointed advisors to KWETB.

According to the sub-committee’s report, it took until November 7 when a meeting took place between Joe Kelly, Jim Ruttle and Brendan Weld before agreement was reached that PKHL would take over from Philip Lee.

As reported in the Leinster Leader in the past, the matter of Philip Lee Solicitor’s bill, which by then had reached €82,398.99, came before the KWETB just before Christmas on December 21.

On December 15, Philip Lee threatened legal action over the unpaid bill, giving KWETB seven days to respond. On December 21, the matter was not reached until tail end of the meeting and the new chairman Noel Merrick committed to give board members information on it by next board meeting, but the following day Philip Lee told the KWETB it was issuing High Court proceedings without further notice, the Sub-Committee’s report revealed.

New KWETB chairman Noel Merrick

On December 24, outgoing Chief Executive Sean Ashe authorised payment to Philip Lee, noting the Bona Fides of the bill, the risk of legal action, the lack of an outcome at the board meeting on December 21 and because board approval is not required for payment of invoices, which is, he asserted, is an executive function.

Commenting on their report, Cllr Réada Cronin told the KWETB meeting yesterday that in the course of their inquiries that the subcommittee was regularly told that their work was “a review and not an investigation”.

She noted that the sub-committee did not feel that the matter had been resolved and added that neither the former chair or vice-chair, Cllrs Ruttle and Weld met with them, although they did communicate in writing. Neither of those councillors, who are still members of the KWETB, were present at yesterday’s meeting either.

Cllr Réada Cronin co-authored the report and believes the matter is not resolved

Responding to the report, Cllr Fiona McLoughlin Healy noted that it wasn’t clear who Philip Lee’s clients were - the board or the Chair and Vice-Chair. And she pushed for the KWETB to hire an outsider to investigate the matter more fully. “This is bigger than us,” she noted.

In the course of their review, the sub-committee was made aware that separate legal advice may have been received from another legal firm, Mason Hayes and Curran, in relation to the Department of Education and Skills investigation. They noted that this was outside of the scope of this review but recommended that it merited  further investigation.

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