A SEMI-STATE company spent more than €800,000 on travel over an eight-year period for its former chief executive and his spouse – an average of more than €100,000 a year.
The Irish National Stud also paid more than €130,000 in household bills for John Clarke and his wife Monica, including electricity and heating, over a 10-year period.
Details of the expenses incurred by Mr Clarke and his wife were obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.
Mr Clarke (59), who was chief executive at the stud for 27 years, left the company in January.
The Clarkes had 40 trips together from January 2002 to January 2010. Ms Clarke’s flight and chauffeur expenses cost the stud €95,000 and Mr Clarke’s expenses, including flights, accommodation, chauffeur and other credit card bills, cost more than €700,000.
The trips were taken so that Mr Clarke could attend horse sales and race meetings.
The bills incurred included flights and chauffeur expenses for five trips to the US taken by the couple in October and November 2002, 2003, 2005, 2006 and 2007 and costing almost €46,000.
For the same five months, Mr Clarke’s credit card bills, also paid for by the stud, came to almost €55,000.
Other trips the couple took included return flights to Paris, London and Milan.
In November 2006, a month after the couple travelled to the US, return flights to Paris cost more than €2,300.
In 2002, return flights for one trip to Paris cost more than €1,600 and flights to Milan in September 2003 cost more than €1,300.
Mr Clarke’s credit card bills related to accommodation and other travel expenses, but not flights. The single largest credit card bill was for almost €18,000, in June 2004. The previous month, the couple had travelled to London and Mr Clarke had made trips to Florence, Nice and Tokyo. The flights to Tokyo, via Paris, cost more than €9,000.
One bill for “travel and entertainment” of more than €11,000 was incurred in June 2006. At Christmas the same year, Mr Clarke’s credit card bill was over €12,000. The following Christmas, 2007, his credit card bill was just under €12,000.
Chauffeur costs included regular trips to and from Dublin airport for the couple and for Mr Clarke alone. A chauffeur trip from the stud to Cashel, Co Tipperary, in February 2006 cost €440 and was taken by Mr Clarke, who had a company car.
In 2002, almost €1,800 was paid for two days when a driver was required to drive Mr Clarke from Chicago to Arlington Park, Illinois, and “wait during racing”.
During part of Mr Clarke’s tenure, the family lived at Tully House within the grounds of the stud, in Co Kildare. The five-bedroom house is now vacant.
More than €134,000 was spent by the stud on bills related to the house from January 1999 to December 2009. Heating and lighting bills for the house were paid by the stud, totalling over €37,000. Mr Clarke paid a monthly contribution of €133 toward the bills, totalling just over €4,500 over the 10 years.
Furniture, carpets and redecoration for the house cost in excess of €97,000 over the 10 years.
Among the bills was one for more than €30,000 for redecoration work in 2003, more than €8,000 for shelving units in 2005 and more than €22,000 for a patio in 2008. Some €2,819 was paid for a “1.5-seater chair” in 2007 and in 2008, a rosewood table and footstool cost more than €3,400.
In June 2005, furniture and a fireplace were purchased costing almost €2,500 and in December 2006, a furniture bill of €5,295 was paid.
A bill for more than €4,000 described as “Tully House dishwasher lights” was paid in April 2005. Further decoration work was carried out at a cost of just over €5,000 in April 2006.
BLOODLINE: NATIONAL STUD SET UP TO PROMOTE THOROUGHBRED BREEDING
THE IRISH National Stud is a thoroughbred horse breeding facility based at Tully, Co Kildare.
It was established in 1946 under the National Stud Act 1945 and is owned by the Government.
It promotes Irish bloodstock internationally and offers boarding facilities for racehorses, stallions and mares in foal. It is also involved in tourism and is the home of the Japanese Gardens tourist attraction.
The National Stud’s directors, appointed by the Minister for Agriculture, are Jim Beecher, Mick Leavy, John Osborne (now chief executive), Trevor Stewart and Dermot Weld.
The board has been chaired by Chryss O’Reilly since 1998.
