asked the Minister for Finance whether approximately £20,000 worth of excavator buckets for use on Office of Public Works drainage schemes were recently imported; and, if so, if he will state why these buckets which hitherto had been manufactured at the central engineering works at Inchicore are now being imported.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Importation of Excavator Buckets.
The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative, but the implication in the second part is incorrect as it has not been the practice to meet the excavator bucket requirements of drainage schemes by manufacture at the central engineering workshop. Some buckets have from time to time been manufactured but the workshop is primarily a repair and maintenance depot. The recently imported buckets could not, for various reasons, have been manufactured there.