Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Senator very much. On the funding point, we have further information, following on from the discussion we had in the Seanad, which we might just send to the Chair and which could be circulated to Deputies and Senators, with regard to a better breakdown, particularly for 2018 and 2019, on the issue of funding. Just to mention again, there is no annual funding of that particular organisation but it will be seen there is Covid funding and other elements of once-off funding, and that is what that information will show.

We believe it is very important that we take the learnings of the investigation into what happened in St. John Ambulance Ireland and the benefit of the work undertaken by Mr. Justice Shannon. That is why Tusla and my Department have jointly set up the organisational and institutional abuse working group, which is to look at how organisations like this and other organisations can better understand the potential risks within their own organisation and how the State, my Department and Tusla can better police those instances.

In the first instance, this new working group has been asked to examine Mr. Justice Shannon's report and bring recommendations back to both ourselves and to Tusla on the steps to be taken and the issues of child safeguarding. The safeguarding statement will be among those issues that that working group examines.