Tom Barry (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this Private Members’ Bill. The time allocated makes one feel like one is trying to deliver a Gettysburg address on this important topic.

A charities regulator is needed and I welcome the Minister’s announcement in this regard. We need effective oversight, sanctions and transparency in this sector. If these three elements can be married together, we will certainly be moving in the right direction. I compliment the Committee of Public Accounts on its sterling work in this area to date and wish it well in the future. I hope well known high-profile individuals who, in my opinion, abused their position of trust when they took out full-page newspaper advertisements to scaremonger and defeat the referendum to extend the powers of Oireachtas committees will reflect on their inappropriate actions and their consequences. People want, expect and deserve answers about the banking crisis and the demoralising behaviour regarding charities. In the case of the latter, it is unacceptable that generous people have been deceived in such a manner.

I fail to see the need for enormous salaries for chief executives of charities. Charities need to be looked at critically to ensure the primary beneficiaries of charities and donations to them are not the charities themselves. Transparency is key in this area. As we have been for the past several years, we need to tidy up one more aspect of poor governance, a problem that has dogged this country for far too long.

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