Ó Snodaigh critical of Flannery’s use of firm to bill Rehab

The billing of Rehab by director and long-time senior Fine Gael adviser Frank Flannery for consulting services using a dissolved company was criticised by Sinn Féin TD Aengus Ó Snodaigh in the Dáil.

Mr Flannery invoiced the charity for €66,000 in 2012 and €11,000 in 2011 using Laragh Consulting Ltd, with an address in Finglas, Dublin.

The company was set up in February 2007, but dissolved two years later never having filed accounts.

Regulation
Mr Ó Snodaigh said the lack of regulation of charities was doing untold damage to the charities themselves and to citizens depending on them.

Ongoing revelations of excessive pay to charity chief executives, serious questions over fundraising and a lack of transparency and accountability had deeply angered citizens, particularly those suffering at the end of the brutal austerity cuts in recent years, said Mr Ó Snodaigh

“What has been uncovered at CRC, Irish Water, Poolbeg and elsewhere is, I believe, a toxic political culture of top-ups, bonuses, jobs for the boys and contracts for the elite,” said Mr Ó Snodaigh.

“Again, we read today of a former chief executive of Rehab, a long-time adviser of Fine Gael, billing the company for consultancy services using a dissolved company.

"That suggests something wrong in the state of Denmark. ''

In the Seanad, Terry Leyden (FF) said he complimented The Irish Times and two of its writers, Colm Keena and Arthur Beesley, "on an expose today on the goings-on at Rehab''.

Extraordinary
It related to the activities of a director who had a dissolved company but billed Rehab for fees, he said.

“As the Taoiseach said, he is lifting stones and the maggots are coming out,’’ Mr Leyden said.

"They are not Fianna Fáil maggots, but they are Fine Gael maggots in a big way.''

He said it was extraordinary that a dissolved company could be used to bill a national organisation for such money.

In the Dáil, Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore called for the publication of the salary paid to Rehab chief executive Angela Kerins.

“I am in favour of transparency and I am in favour of organisations making known in their accounts, for example, the salaries they pay to their chief executives.’’

He was replying to Mr Ó Snodaigh, who asked if he agreed that Ms Kerins should reveal her salary.

Mr Gilmore said the Government was implementing the Charities Act and establishing a regulatory authority, to be set up later in the year, so that there could be public confidence in charitable organisations.

Billy Kelleher (FF) said the provision of matching funding, in the context of lottery schemes for charities, had been a common practice for many years.

The information was freely available to the Department of Justice, he added.