THE staff of Horse Sport Ireland have written to a number of government ministers regarding the ongoing examinership of the organisation and the security of their jobs.

The letter, understood to have been sent on behalf of the vast majority of the body’s 47 staff, was sent primarily to Martin Heydon TD, Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine with An Taoiseach, Micheál Martin TD, Tánaiste, Simon Harris TD, Minister Patrick O’Donovan TD, Minister Noel Grealish TD, Minister Timmy Dooley TD, Minister Niall Collins TD and Minister Charlie McConalogue TD copied in too.

It is understood HSI is facing a group redundancy scenario involving 10 positions, with expressions of interest for voluntary redundancies closing this week.

The letter centres around their concern over the tender for National Breeding Services (NBS) from the Department of Agriculture (DAFM), which is worth €6m. The objective of the NBS is to implement strategies and initiatives in support of Irish sport horse breeders and producers, and it involves the delivery of breeding and production incentives and knowledge transfer programmes.

HSI was notified that its renewal tender for the DAFM National Breeding Services had been accepted on July 31st. However, no contracts have been signed. The latest response from DAFM on the matter states “this procurement process is on-going”.

Deeply concerned

“As employees, we are deeply concerned about the future of our jobs and our ability to continue supporting our families,” the staff letter states.

“The execution of the National Breeding Services contract is now the single most important issue facing the organisation. Without it, the Examiner will be deprived of the certainty of future finance required to formulate a viable plan to emerge from examinership. In those circumstances, the prospects of HSI successfully emerging from examinership would be highly unlikely as outlined by AAB’s independent expert report submitted to the High Court.

“For us, this is not simply an administrative or contractual matter. The outcome will directly affect our livelihoods, our families and the future of an organisation to which we are dedicated professionally. We respectfully ask that the contract is executed without further delay.

“HSI competed for the National Breeding Services contract through a public procurement process and, following assessment by an independent panel, was recently selected as the successful bidder. All the staff are proud of the part we played in winning this contract again. The procurement process has now concluded, and the cooling-off period has ended. We are not seeking any alteration to that outcome. We are simply requesting that the contract arising from that completed process be executed as soon as possible.

“For staff, the consequences are very real. HSI employs 47 people. The loss of those jobs would have a substantial impact on employees and their families.

“The NBS contract is central to the organisation’s operations. It pays the salaries of the eight staff who deliver the service directly. It contributes 45% of the employment cost of a further 12 colleagues. It also contributes 45% of HSI’s overall business overheads. Remove that contract and you do not leave a smaller HSI. You remove the financial foundation on which a viable HSI and our jobs rests.”

The letter goes on to outline how many breeders rely on HSI for passporting services and the cost of the specialist IT system developed to support these functions.

“We have been advised that in the event of the organisation being unable to emerge successfully from examinership, it would fall under the control of the liquidator. At that point, the system simply cannot just be transferred to DAFM or another organisation,” the letter states.

Grant payments

“More than 44,000 recipients of NBS grant payments depend on the effective administration of schemes delivered through HSI. Any disruption to these arrangements would create uncertainty for breeders and place massive pressure on the Department to establish alternative arrangements within a very short timeframe, which would likely take several months to resolve.

“HSI and its staff are not asking for special treatment, nor are we seeking to revisit the outcome of a completed procurement process. We are simply asking that the contract arising from that process, in which we were successful in winning, be concluded so that the staff, the Examiner and the wider sector can have the certainty needed to plan for the future.

“We recognise that, even after you sign the National Breeding Services contract, difficult decisions still lie ahead. There may be restructuring and there may be redundancies. We would therefore ask that you and your department continue to engage with HSI and the Examiner to minimise the impact on staff and preserve as many jobs as possible.

“As HSI is not a unionised workplace, we have no formal channel through which to collectively advocate for our jobs and our families. For that reason, we are writing to you directly. Collectively, we represent 47 jobs, 47 families and decades of experience dedicated to serving the sport horse sector and equestrian sport. We respectfully urge you to facilitate the execution of the NBS contract without delay.”

DAFM confirmed it received the letter stating: “The Department has a very good working relationship with the company and its staff and acknowledges the challenges ahead for them. The matter of examinership is a legal process and, accordingly, the Department has no comment concerning this on-going process.”