Ireland Incorporated
Everyone is familiar with the phrase Ireland Inc., but few would have guessed that it has its basis in bizarre fact.
Tom Prendeville, 18 Feb 2010
Dunn & Bradstreet, the world’s oldest corporate listing and rating agency, insists that the Irish Government, and all its various departments, are not a ‘government of the people’ as everyone understands them to be, but rather a collection of Companies.
No, seriously! Even the Garda Siochana, which some critics argue has become a revenue generating agency for the State, thanks to the penalty point system, is not what it appears to be: it is listed by the corporate ratings agency as a company, with corporate offices at Phoenix Park.
Follow this: when a motorist is stopped by the Garda Síochána – which is a company – the paperwork is sent to the DPP – which, bizarrely, is another company.
Thereafter, if the motorist is found ‘guilty,’ the Department of Public Prosecutions instructs another company, the Irish Courts Service, to issue a summons.
And if the person fails to pay the summons, they are incarcerated in a prison run by yet another company called the Irish Prison Service.
You are probably familiar with the phrase ‘trading as’. Well, according to Dunn & Bradstreet, which was established in 1841, the Department of Justice itself is a company, and trades under the name of Office of Director of Public Prosecutions, with registered offices at Chapter House, Dublin. It also trades – as companies are entitled to do – under the additional name Courts Division, which runs all the courts from the lowly District to the Supreme Court.
Elsewhere, the revenue-gathering arm of the state, The Office of the Revenue Commissioners, is listed as a private company with registered offices at Dublin Castle.
Meanwhile, the Department of Taoiseach is also listed as a company which trades as ‘Roinn An Taoisaigh.’ Even the Irish Army is apparently a company.
The Electricity & Public Lighting Department is an agency virtually no one in this country has ever heard of: it is a trade name of Dublin City Council, which is also listed as a company.
In response to a query from Hot Press, the Attorney General’s office was unable to shed any light on why all the Government Departments are listed internationally as companies and referred the query to the Department of Finance.
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