A damning internal audit of the Catholic Institute for Deaf People found numerous financial discrepancies as well as excessive spending on its credit cards, including a €155 bottle of whiskey.

The Catholic Institute for Deaf People (CIPD) has been accused of “hiding” the extent of wanton spending from its main funder, the HSE, in an internal audit which lays bare the huge amounts being splashed out by some senior personnel working there between 2012 and 2015.

As a €15m state-of-the-art facility for the deaf opens in Dublin, John Cradden, who is deaf, looks at the challenges faced by a community trying to keep its identity while pursuing social integration