AN OFFER from Mayor John Moran to use his mayoral fund to prop up the International Rugby Experience (IRE) has been rejected.
Mayor John Moran at a special meeting of Limerick City and County Council last week pledged €100,000 per year for the next three years towards keeping the tourist attraction open after it was announced that it would close for good on December 23.
However, it is understood that the IRE wrote to Mayor Moran saying that it was declining the offer and directing him to communicate that to the elected councillors, which he did at a meeting.
Speaking to Live 95 News Mayor John Moran said his offer remains on the table.
“My thoughts are with the families, the staff that are working there, and how we can actually find a solution that keeps the museum open. And the offer remains”, he told the local radio station.
The Mayor said that it would be wise to “think of the bigger picture” as regards the future of the IRE.
Keeping the experience open for the next three years, he said, “allows us time to deal with all of the many other issues that the people know we’ve been talking about”.
“Demands on our budget, whether the national government will help or not, there’s a general election coming, who knows who the government will be.
“It just parks all of those issues nicely for a period that allowed us to all get back to, well, essentially not having the museum closed after Christmas”.
It is understood that18 jobs will be lost of the landmark building and tourist attraction closes it’s current operation.
It was announced in April that the IRE was to be gifted to Limerick by the JP McManus Charitable Foundation, and run in its day-to-day operations by Discover Limerick DAC.
However, a statement on behalf of the tourist attraction the week before last confirmed that negotiations between the Foundation and Limerick City and County Council over the handover of the building had reached a standstill.
The multi-million euro IRE was first opened in May 2023, described as the brainchild of billionaire JP McManus and fronted by Munster Rugby legend Paul O’Connell.
In an interview with presenter Joe Nash on Live 95 radio, IRE CEO Barry Hannon said that there had been numerous meetings with independent experts called in to examine the costings of the building’s handover.
These costings had been agreed in principal between the board and the Council on August 23, so, Mr Hannon told Live95, the board was very surprised to learn that councillors had been informed there would be a further €6.2m to be paid out.
The figures presented to councillors included the cost of stamp duty, VAT, redundancy payments and “reimagined costs”, which Mr Hannon claimed were “over-inflated and were not included in the heads of agreement” both parties had seen in August.
At a Council meeting last week to discuss the future of the attraction, Council Deputy Director General Gordon Daly explained that additional information presented to councillors last week was so they have a view of “a full financial impact of the report on the Council and the budgetary implications”.
