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

I will try to address two elements, the first of which is the issue of funding. As the Deputy knows, St. John Ambulance is not getting anything from my Department. Previously, I had said it was not getting anything from the State, but I have corrected the record and written to the Oireachtas joint committee in respect of the fact it did get significant once-off funding during Covid from a number of Covid funds, and it has also got some funding from local authorities. Nevertheless, it continues to receive no direct funding from my Department or, to my knowledge, from any other Department in the form of consistent, year-on-year funding. It has applied for certain once-off funds and some local authorities give it once-off funding, while some local authorities give it a donation in lieu of work at, perhaps, a big sports event or the like.

The Deputy asked who is being held to account, which is a very fair question. The role my Department now has is to oversee the implementation of the Shannon recommendations, and holding someone to account was not one of his recommendations. I have no doubt the Deputy feels it should have been, as others probably do too, but I can work only towards what Dr. Shannon said because my Department cannot work towards emotion, for want of a better word given I am not trying to minimise what the Deputy is saying. We have clear recommendations and we are working towards their delivery, and I have never promised to be able to go beyond that. As the Deputy knows, I do not have a lever in respect of St. John Ambulance and I cannot turn off any funding tap, as might happen in other organisations.

It is about engagement and the organisation has engaged with us and brought in the Dr. Shannon report. As I said, I have received the quarterly report and my officials and I will have the opportunity to go through that in detail in advance of the meeting of 11 December. If it is all right, I will write to the Deputy after the meeting and let him know how the engagement is going. He will have had the opportunity to read the quarterly report before that, and if there are any specific points he would like us to raise, he might let me know and we can try to do that.

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