ALMOST €1.5 MILLION in rent could be paid by the Department of Health over the next 15 years on an office left vacant by a State agency.
The Women's Health Council was subsumed into the Department of Health last October as part of a cost-saving measure to rationalise some 40 State agencies in response to the economic downturn.
Some €50,000 in rent has been paid on the unoccupied city centre office since it was vacated in October, information released to The Irish Timesunder a Freedom of Information request has revealed.
The annual rent for the council's former office at the Irish Life Centre, Abbey Street Lower, Dublin is €98,500 per annum.
The department holds a lease on the office until November 2024. If the property remained unoccupied and the lease unbroken over €1.47 million in rent would be paid by the department. So far the office has not been sublet and is unoccupied, the FOI response from the Department of Health said. "We are exploring all options for the remaining term of this lease, including subletting," the letter said. The department has not entered discussions with the landlord on the cost of breaking the lease "pending the clarification of possible alternative arrangements," it said.
The office was leased from Irish Life which is represented by Irish Estates Management.
Last October the council was relocated to the Department of Health and Children, Hawkins House, Dublin.
The Irish Life office housed the council since the early days of its existence. The council had seven staff prior to the merger. The council cost €800,000 to run according to accounts
The Women's Health Council was established on a statutory basis in June 1997 by former Fine Gael minister for health Michael Noonan. The order was signed just days before the government changed and Taoiseach Brian Cowen took over the portfolio.
The Combat Poverty Agency (CPA) was another agency which was rationalised as part of the State's cost-cutting programme.
Last month the Irish Timesrevealed the Department of Social and Family Affairs was paying €400,000 in rent on the vacant offices of the CPA.
