Waterford County Councillor John Pratt attended last weekend’s ‘Facebook for Councillors’ conference in Killarney.
A Waterford County Councillor was among those who attended last weekend’s controversial Facebook conference in Killarney.
Tallow-based Cllr John Pratt (Labour) spent two nights at the event which was held at the three star Killarney Heights Hotel.
Entitled ‘Facebook for Councillors – a Business Perspective’, the crash-course aimed to provide councillors with knowledge of the social networking site and how it could be used to their advantage.
The course attracted widespread criticism last week before it commenced, branded as a “waste of taxpayers’ money.”
However, Cllr Pratt says he didn’t do anything wrong by attending.
“I don’t go to conferences for the sake of going. I go if they’re beneficial to me and the people I represent,” he stated.
“When it started getting bad press, I felt that if I pulled out, it would look like I was doing something wrong, but I didn’t feel that way. I want to be open and straight. Anyone I’ve met since, I’ve told them I was there. I never hide anything,” he said.
A place on the course cost almost €200 per councillor – a bill footed by the taxpayer. That amount doesn’t take account of additional expenses which may be claimed.
Cllr Pratt attended the conference all day Saturday, and stayed Saturday night, accompanied by his wife.
He also decided to spend Sunday night at the hotel, but stressed that payment for the second night’s stay, and payment for the duration of his wife’s stay, was from his own pocket.
Cllr Pratt believes the conference was very beneficial and helped him understand more about Facebook.
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Well we will eagerly await the new facebook page for Mr Pratt, after all what is the point of attending if you don’t intend to utilise the training to reach out to your constituents.
Isn’t it truly amazing that the rest of us lowly mortals had to learn about Facebook all on our own. We must be geniuses.
Mr. Pratt you are in a hole – stop digging. Your excuses are more nauseating than your deed.
It is very very true that these politicians have still not realised that this country is broke.
I am sickened once again by the high handed superior attitude of a elected representative who should be giving example and leadership.
John Pratt . you are an example of the scourge of politians and civil servants livng it up on the backs of ordinary people.
Weekend pissup to learn to use facebook. get real .
I agree with you Mick,but these people don’t live on the same on the same planet as us there only in politics for the freebies it be interesting to see how many people would be in politics if they couldn’t claim for expenses
Isn’t this guy truly amazing. He is typical of the type of wasters that are running our Country into the ground today. We all learned about Facebook ourselves through our own intelligence, this guy , evidently doesn’t have the intelligence to do that though, again typical of the Government politicians. either he is too stupid to learn himself or to get someone to show him, or else he (like Biffo) fancied a weekend away with the wife for a boozing session. Disgraceful I say, and shame on you, you PRATT.
The solution is simple. Do not vote for them. Why is it the electorate seem to absolve themselves from any responsibility for the actions of those in public office? We still have the “he’s a cute hoor but fair play to him for getting away with it” attitude. You reap what you sow and now we’re paying the price.
Ron, I am afraid it isn’t as simple as that, unfortunately there are still alot of sheep in this country who vote for Fianna Fail simply because their parents did, and parents befor them, and all that dribble!There are however some of us out there with a brain , that we can decide for ourselves as individuals, but the worrying statistic is that these gangsters are at 18% in the current polls, even though thats an all time low for them, it still means that 1 in 5 people or so still support these tramps (Fianna Fail). So while I agree with what you are saying to a certain extent, I just wanted to point out that we are not all unbelievably still supporting Fianna fail or worse (possibly) the Greens.
Instead of giving out about the so and so’s we should be taking some action, to remove them permantly from Office.