There must be a major discrepancy in the reference costs applied to Department of Agriculture work and that of the Department of Housing, The Dealer reckons. The Office of Public Works’ now infamous bike shelter cost €336,000, which is about the cost of a 30-point rotary parlour or a slatted shed for 100 cows.

Now The Dealer wouldn’t dismiss the OPW’s new fandangled glass bicycle shelter as a mere shed, albeit it features concrete and steel, but it must have had reference costs a multiple of any farm building under TAMS.

Apparently the construction job faced “several unique challenges”. Did they include the local digger man being double booked or hitting a water pipe I wonder?

If only the OPW had been able to reclaim the VAT, it could have saved a few quid.