Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Chairman knows and we all know from our constituency work and our communities of the great lengths small businesses and companies go to in order to comply with various company law requirements and to file their returns on time. I have not looked back any further, but we have an organisation that received €202 million in taxpayers' money in 2012 which did not did not bother to produce reports on time for the years 2011 and 2012 and which is now being fined by the Companies Registration Office. When Mr. Jermyn is writing a statement on behalf of the St. Vincent's Healthcare Group, he might address that issue.

There is another issue relating to corporate governance in the St. Vincent's Healthcare Group. Mr. O'Brien was in the room with us last week when we had the then CRC representatives before the committee. Members of the committee, me included, were highly critical, as were Mr. O'Brien and Ms McGuinness, of the crossover of directors between the Friends of the CRC group and the CRC board. There was a view - I am trying to summarise what happened at the meeting - that there was a lack of safeguards since there were directors of a fundraising organisation who were also directors of the overall corporate board.

St. Vincent's has a Friends of St. Vincent's group as well, called the St. Vincent's Foundation. It has four directors, Professor Noel Whelan, Mr. Nicholas C. Jermyn, who is also the CEO, Mr. Stewart Harrington and Professor Michael Keane. St. Vincent's Healthcare Group also has a board, which comprises the same four gentlemen.

The CRC issue was an interesting media story. Many of the names were well-known public figures. Deputy Ross referred to some political involvement and so on. We have to be very careful that we apply the same level of standards to all organisations and all those operating under section 38 and that we do not single out one or two. Is it your view, as it was last week in respect of the CRC, that there should not be a complete cross-over between the fund-raising arm and the board of any section 38 organisation?