Former Rehab CEO Kerins lost her job over PAC ‘witch hunt’

Former CEO of the Rehab Group Angela Kerins has claimed she lost her job and her health suffered as a direct consequence of her questioning by the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee in relation to State funding of the Rehab group.

Yesterday, she launched High Court proceedings claiming the Public Accounts Committee has conducted itself unlawfully, has shown bias towards her, acted outside its remit, and has committed a malfeasance in public office.

Her counsel, John Rogers SC, said Ms Kerins was questioned by members of the PAC in a manner that suggested they were “engaged in a witch hunt”.

Counsel saod that, as a direct result of the unfair questioning and commentary at the PAC hearing last February, Ms Kerins suffered “a collapse in her health”, resulting in her hospitalisation for nine days.

She came before the PAC during its examination of state funding to the Rehab Group. Ms Kerins of Temple Hill, Blackrock, Co Dublin, worked for Rehab since 1992 and was CEO from 2006 until last April.

She is also seeking damages for the personal injury and the damage to her reputation she claims she suffered, arising out of what she claims was her unlawful examination by PAC on February 27.

Counsel said the purpose of the action “was not to shut down” the PAC’s examination of funding to Rehab, but to prevent PAC from continuing to pursue matters in relation to Ms Kerins’ tenure with Rehab. She has brought the action, to vindicate her rights against what she claims is an unlawful attack against her good name.

Ms Kerins seeks orders from the court, including one restraining the PAC from further pursing the examination of Rehab’s accounts relating to her employment with Rehab.

The action is against the members of the PAC including the chairman, TD John McGuinness, the Clerk of Dáil Eireann, the Clerk of PAC, Ireland, and the Attorney General.

Ms Kerins further seeks an injunction restraining PAC from publishing any report, arising out of her examination that makes findings connected with her remuneration or employment with Rehab, and her appearance before the PAC that impugns her good name. She also seeks all references to her and her employment with Rehab removed from the record of the PAC, and an order preventing the PAC from compelling her to attend any future hearing in respect of its examination of payments to the Rehab group.

She further seeks declarations from the court that the PAC has no jurisdiction to examine or report on expenditure of monies by the Rehab Group, and, in particular, expenditure concerning Ms Kerins, and a declaration the examination of her by the PAC is tainted with bias of individual PAC members.

Mr Rogers said Ms Kerins was subjected to prejudicial, hostile, and damaging commentary by members of the PAC arising out of her attendance at a PAC hearing on February 27, and her non-attendance at a PAC hearing on April 10, which was due to ill health.

Mr Rogers said that, at the first hearing, his client was subjected to improper questioning by PAC members, including TDs Kieran O’Donnell, Mary Lou McDonald, Robert Dowds, Shane Ross, and John Deasy.

The questions related to issues about her car, her salary, her decision to write to an Irish-American website about an article it published about her, about her family members and people close to her having commercial relationships with Rehab, and about bonus payments.

She was also subjected to improper commentary following her non-attendance. Mr Ross has contributed columns in the Sunday Independent which attacked Ms Kerins' reputation in a manner which “discloses a clear personal animus”, counsel said, adding that PAC lacks the jurisdiction to examine Rehab’s expenditure. Rehab, he said, is a private body and has never been audited by the Comptroller and Auditor General.

Permission to bring the action was granted, on an ex parte basis, by Mr Justice John Hedigan. The judge said the issues raised were “grave and profound”. The case will come before the court again on November 4.

In a statement outside the court, Ms Kerins said the events surround her exit as CEO of the Rehab Group — “an organsiation I have dedicated a large part of my working life to” — have been “deeply distressing for myself and my family.”

In the seven-paragraph statement read by her solicitor, Aidan Eames, she said she had attempted to avoid “the legal impasse that has occurred” and “the unfair treatment that I suffered at the Public Accounts Committee”.

“Regretfully the Public Accounts Committee continues to attempt to conduct an unfair, unlawful and prejudicial investigation against me,” she said. “I have no alternative but to apply to the courts for protection of my rights as a private citizen.”

Ms Kerins ended the statement by asking that her privacy and that of her family be respected.