John Deasy (Waterford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Notwithstanding everything that Deputy Harris has said, I wish to raise an issue regarding this entire area and one which is slightly overdue. We need to exercise some caution as to how we do our business when it comes to these charitable organisations or organisations that are in the charities sector. I have been contacted, over the past couple of weeks, by a number of CEOs as well as by people who work at a senior level in umbrella organisations for charities in this country. To say that donations and fund-raising efforts - an issue that the Vice Chairman has raised again and again - has diminished is putting it lightly. They are under severe pressure and have seen huge reductions in their fund-raising efforts. As we do our business on the committee - and there are legitimate questions for some of these organisations that have been raised by individuals on the committee - we need to strike a balance. We need to understand the effect that our deliberations have on the charities sector in Ireland, which has been very damaging and considerable. I am not surmising that but have got that information from people who are at the coalface of charities here. Whether we like it or not, people are watching us and are horrified by some of the revelations that have come from the committee. At the same time we need to be conscious of the effect it is having. As we look at Rehab and these other organisations, we need to be more aware of that. I am referring here to the huge amounts of money being lost to the sector through donations compared with what they were taking in hitherto.