Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I agree with Deputy McGrath that it is important public confidence is retained and renewed in charitable organisations and that people who contribute to charities can have confidence their contributions are used for the purposes for which they are intended, in other words, that they go to front-line services. That is why the measures being taken to deal with the issues of top-up payments and transparency in the section 38 organisations are so important. The bottom line is that the agencies and organisations which are substantially funded from the public purse should adhere to stated pay policy.

The chairman and members of the board of the CRC and the former chief executive appeared before the Committee of Public Accounts yesterday together with the HSE and the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. On foot of calls for the board of the CRC to resign, the chairman indicated he would call a meeting of the members of the board to consider their position. It is regrettable that the former chief executive of the CRC, who resigned this week, decided not to attend the Committee of Public Accounts hearing. The HSE will be following up urgently on the governance deficits identified in the CRC and the issues that arose relating to pension arrangements. I understand that arising from the PAC hearing yesterday the HSE has been asked to appear again before the Committee of Public Accounts on Thursday, 19 December together with representatives from the Mater hospital, which has a role in respect of superannuation arrangements in the CRC. Officials from the Department of Health and the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform will also attend at that committee hearing.

Deputy McGrath referred to the general subject of top-up payments and section 38 agencies. The HSE has a team of senior managers following up with individual agencies in respect of non-compliance with public pay policy. The reason these breaches of policy came to light in the first place was on foot of an audit of the section 38 agencies. As part of this process, the director general of the HSE is meeting the chairpersons of all section 38 organisations today. This meeting will focus on the requirement of the board of each agency to strengthen governance standards further and will set out the need to furnish the HSE with a compliance statement from the current financial year and for each year thereafter. This statement will be required to be approved by the board of each agency on an annual basis and signed by the chairman and another director on behalf of the board. It will be submitted to the HSE together with the organisation's annual audited accounts. This annual compliance statement will be required in addition to the annual service agreement between the agency and the HSE.

Further and separate meetings will be held by senior HSE managers with all of the disability organisations and hospitals concerned in the week commencing 16 December to ensure appropriate steps are taken to bring these organisations into compliance with public pay policy and that any governance deficits are rectified immediately.

Deputy McGrath asked me specifically about the commencement of the Charities Act. I understand it is intended to commence that early in the new year.

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