Results 1-20 of 1,138,405 for in 'Dáil debates' OR in 'Committee meetings' (speaker:Michael McNamara OR speaker:Maurice Quinlivan OR speaker:James O'Connor OR speaker:Patrick O'Donovan OR speaker:Denis Naughten OR speaker:Emer Higgins OR speaker:Éamon Ó Cuív OR speaker:Simon Harris OR speaker:Pearse Doherty OR speaker:Matt Carthy OR speaker:Éamon Ó Cuív67 OR speaker:Cathal Crowe OR speaker:Éamon Ó Cuív46 OR speaker:Dara Calleary OR speaker:Duncan Smith OR speaker:Louise O'Reilly OR speaker:Frank Feighan OR speaker:Rose Conway-Walsh OR speaker:Dessie Ellis OR speaker:Pat Buckley OR speaker:Joe McHugh OR speaker:Éamon Ó Cuív61 OR speaker:Jim O'Callaghan OR speaker:Éamon Ó Cuív1 OR speaker:Brian Leddin OR speaker:Colm Brophy OR speaker:Ossian Smyth OR speaker:Martin Kenny OR speaker:Claire Kerrane OR speaker:Jackie Cahill OR speaker:John McGuinness OR speaker:Patricia Ryan)

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Verona Murphy: We look forward to having the regulator back on that basis. I thank Ms Delaney.

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ciarán Cannon: I thank the witnesses for being here today. I was fortunate enough to head up a charity for almost seven years and I know the value of the work the regulator does in sustaining the public's trust in the charity sector as a whole and allowing charities to continue doing the good work they do. I thank it for that. In May of this year, the regulator issued a statement urging charities to be...

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ms Madeleine Delaney: The Deputy is correct that attendance is voluntary. We have quite good attendance but we are concerned that we are not reaching the volunteer-only very local charities that we really need to reach if we are to help them put in place governance and oversight measures, which is where charities can ultimately be exposed. We are doing a particular campaign or initiative...

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ciarán Cannon: The provision Ms Delaney refers to has not yet been enacted. Is the regulator proactively seeking that power to oblige charities, particularly those recently established charities, to attend webinars? I would argue these webinars are very much in their interests as regards their governance, the public's trust in them and their credibility. Would the regulator encourage Government or the...

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ms Madeleine Delaney: We are just waiting for the various provisions of the Act to be commenced. There are quite a lot of amendments in it. We have been engaging with Department officials on it, working out the practical implications of various aspects and trying to ascertain what would be for the very short term, the medium term and the long term. That provision certainly fits into the...

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ms Madeleine Delaney: One challenge is remaining agile.

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ciarán Cannon: What does that mean?

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ms Madeleine Delaney: It means being more proactive as regards how we deal with matters that arise. It goes back to Deputy Verona Murphy's point. Understandably, in the first years of our establishment, in addition to getting up and running, we have looked at every single concern that has been raised with us. That is because we needed to build an understanding of the sector and the...

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Paul McAuliffe: I thank the witnesses for being here this morning and the Comptroller and Auditor General for putting in the work on the report. I agree with Deputy Cannon that it is a very complex landscape and that we are dealing with charities of different capacities and sizes. I think roughly 11,000 charities are registered. Has their turnover been categorised in any way? How many fall into the very...

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Paul McAuliffe: Does Ms Delaney have a breakdown for the number of charities that have incomes of less than €10,000 or €5,000 per year?

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ms Madeleine Delaney: Less than €10,000 is 12%.

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Paul McAuliffe: If a charity has less than €10,000, it is an incredibly small operation. It more than likely does not have any paid staff and is mostly volunteer run. Equally, the auditing requirements are very onerous. Regarding audit fees in some cases, I know of one group with a total income of €2,500 and the cost of auditing is just north of €1,000. Has any consideration been...

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ms Madeleine Delaney: There are some provisions included in the amendment Act and there are thresholds which significantly reduce the obligation on lower income charities, and it is to address that issue. The idea is that it will be a staged categorisation.

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Paul McAuliffe: I find it very frustrating, as does the group itself, which I will not name, that to carry out charitable work, and it inherited a legacy structure, 50% of its fundraising is to satisfy the Charities Regulator. While that is necessary, and I cannot see any other way around it, there is scope to have a more agile approach for smaller charities, as Ms Delaney mentioned. I will leave that with...

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ms Madeleine Delaney: We first became aware of it in July 2023, when we received a letter from the former CEO. It was addressed-----

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Paul McAuliffe: They are identified as chief executive No. 2 in the report.

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ms Madeleine Delaney: Yes, that is correct. The letter referred to some cash flow difficulties but not beyond normal ranges and there was nothing to worry about, etc. We had information in our possession because we had been looking at a separate concern regarding the organisation, which is why we had obtained a lot of information. We asked for some specific information relating to a...

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Paul McAuliffe: That is the first concern. Had the cash flow or the financial operational management not become an issue, it is likely that we might not have discovered the many other areas such as the co-mingling of donations, restricted and unrestricted funds, and issues of poor governance decisions by the board and so on. For the Charities Regulator, that must be a lesson in the sense that had the...

Public Accounts Committee: Financial Statements 2023 - Charities Regulatory Authority (17 Oct 2024)

Ms Madeleine Delaney: Yes, it is something we have been reflecting on, even before the extent of it has come to light. It goes back to what we have said about needing to be more proactive. We need to try to use some of our resources to be more proactive in our monitoring. The nature of the financial statements that companies and charities have to file now is such that they can tell us...