IN THESE lean economic times it is imperative that we remember to switch off the lights when we go to bed, darn our socks and generally tighten our belts in the interests of riding out the Big Squeeze relatively unscathed.

What we don't need is State agencies paying out € 3 million in rents to private landlords for office space that should have been built with money dutifully stumped up through the public purse in order to fulfil their statutory duties.

Yet that is exactly what the State agency charged with developing Dublin's much-scaled-backed Digital Hub will be doing this fiscal year, according to testimony which chief executive Philip Flynn is expected to give the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Communications, Energy and Natural Resources next week.

The Digital Hub Development Agency (DHDA) was set up in 2002 with the aim of attracting media and creative companies to its planned 14,864sq m (160,000sq ft) inner-city campus.

Some six years later it has 100 companies employing 750 "high-value knowledge" employees under its wing. However, instead of housing them all in its campus, the agency is renting

7,432sq m (80,000sq ft) of space from nearby landlords to accommodate its tenants' requirements for growth.

Of course, it is not the fault of the agency, which has been beset by a multitude of planning delays, and is currently awaiting - with its development partners - a decision from An Bord Pleanála before it can build the remaining space originally planned.

It is all the more galling for the agency, which is expected to tell the committee it would be - or be close to - self-financing if it didn't have to absorb these additional leasing costs in 2008 and 2009.