Mr. Joe Lynch:

The only thing I can come up with to explain why there has been no engagement with us is that they feel Camphill is a low-cost operation and should be kept that way. We have a very low-cost model and we intend to keep it that way - we do not intend to run away with ourselves. This year alone we have spent €787,000 of our reserve on infrastructural and fire issues within Camphill. The reserve the HSE mentioned as being over €4 million is now certainly below €2 million. That puts us in danger with the Charities regulator because the Charities Regulatory Authority tells us we should have between three months' and six months' running costs in the bank and that would bring the figure up to €6 million. We are caught between a rock and a hard place in that respect.

One of the three communities will run out of cash in the next four to six weeks. We do not have any more money and there is no more money from within Camphill to spread around to all areas. We have already had a cash injection of some €30,000 from central funds but these are down to €88,000 in total so there is no more money to give. The community in question will run into the sand in the next few weeks. We are not sitting on our hands and we have done some fundraising. We applied, using the Camphill banner, for an overdraft facility from the Bank of Ireland and the response from the bank was that it would not approve permanent overdrafts for HSE-funded bodies so there is no money there either. We do not have many options other than to issue protective notices to our staff and ask the HSE to come and collect the 25 people.