A TOWN COUNCILLOR in County Carlow has set himself on a collision course with the County Council after insisting he will not pay a fire brigade bill for €561.54.

Cllr Tom Dermody, of Muinebheag Town Council, incurred the charge after the local ambulance team summoned nine fire officers to his home in Bagenalstown to lift an injured relative down the stairs, being unable to lift him themselves.

Dermody has said he would rather be jailed for non-payment of the charge than to stump up for the bill, insisting that the service was not required.

“The fact of the manner is it’s €561 to carry him down a friggin’ stairs. It’s a ridiculous price!,” Dermody told the Carlow Nationalist newspaper. “The council has started threatening me with solicitors’ letters but I’m not paying it.

“I’ll do the ‘Joy [Mountjoy prison] over it,” Dermody assured the paper.

The bill came about after Dermody’s cousin, staying at the house in early April, fell out of his bed in the early hours of the morning following a night out. When the ambulance arrived and diagnosed a dislocated hip, the driver told Dermody that he and his female colleague would be unable to carry the man on the stretcher themselves, and that the assistance of the fire services would be required.

It was totally unnecessary. I have two sons – one is 26 and the other 21 – and my brother was there as well, and the four of us would be perfectly capable of carrying him down the stairs.

The county council, however, has agreed not to pursue the action until they can discern whether the costs are covered by the injured man’s travel insurance.