Public ignorant of Rehab accounts

Taxpayers have been informed for the first time that they are providing €80m to €90m of Rehab’s total annual funding. To put the scale and sacrifice associated with this State expenditure in context, an annual cut of €60m on special needs assistants in primary schools was prescribed by An Bord Snip Nua in 2009.

But taxpayers and private donors in Ireland, and in the other jurisdictions in which Rehab operates, have never been presented with detailed, audited accounts based on best practice, key performance indicators, and operational outcomes supported by relevant data.

It is as if Rehab functions within an exotic, private feudal enclave of its own creation, answerable to nobody. Why are the public being treated in such a cavalier and off-hand manner, and why did the State tolerate this?

When the Public Accounts Committee enquired about expenditure of €400,000 on Mr Frank Flannery’s consulting services, the Rehab answer was unconvincing and evasive. A response that this money ‘seems’ to have been for ‘international representation’, ‘lobbying’, ‘representing the organisation on certain issues’ and assisting ‘with other items’ was neither insightful nor candid.

Effective leaders do not sidestep responsibility; nor do they hunker behind smokescreens.

Rehab leaders need to promptly demonstrate their understanding of the primacy of transparency and of public accountability, so as to gain public trust and confidence.

The State needs to urgently reconsider the justification for public money being cascaded into a secret vacuum of vanity, spin doctors, blatant self-interest and evasion.

Myles Duffy

Glenageary

Co Dublin