Mr. John Farrelly:

I am not convinced that the data is absolutely correct in triangulating across the sector about what is and is not a section 39 charity. I am fairly confident that 778 of the registered charities are HSE-funded section 39 organisations. Let us remember that health and social services is quite a diverse area and thousands of not-for-profit entities receive funding. For example, sports bodies and different entities are excluded and are not charities. I am fairly sure that there are 778 registered charities at the moment. Some of the rest of the group that receive HSE funding may be charities but we would have to establish that detail.

When the register moved from Revenue, many entitles were deemed registered and granted a CHY number. We are working on reconciling that information and any anomalies in the register. Section 39 funding can help us to triangulate information. When I arrived in May, I found that the information, on those deemed registered, was not as robust as I would have liked it to be and we carried out a few exercises. When we profiled 1,000 companies, we found that 60% of them were intact and active but 20% were no longer companies and were dormant. Even though the latter were on the register, they did not exist in reality. That stems from the fact that originally charities were looked at through a tax lens and trust was given if one did not breach it, but now we have the Charities Regulatory Authority. One of my first tasks as CEO is to have a proper intact register that identifies the registered charitable organisations and, thus, people can have confidence in the data and approach. Critical to having such a register is working with other State bodies, including the HSE.

In terms of resources, when I started on 16 May my authority employed 16 staff but now we have 27 whole-time equivalent staff. The authority is being totally reviewed in terms of the human and financial resources needed to implement the Charities Act. I do not believe in big over-sized organisations. My sense of it is that the authority would probably need to have between 49 and 50 staff. I also want to recruit the right people with the right competencies. We are putting in place an IT system. Of critical importance will be the data that we collect. We will share data with other regulators and bodies in order that the appropriate law is applied. I am happy enough how things are going on the resources front and I envisage that we have reached halfway.