May I thank the Cathaoirleach for allowing me to raise this matter on the Adjournment. The workers in the Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children have been on strike since June in an attempt to prevent the redundancy of one of their colleagues and in an attempt to secure back payment of wages estimated to total £90,000. I find it appalling that conditions in the ISPCC were such as to lead to a strike by some of what are quite manifestly the most dedicated child care workers in the country. I am astonished, too, that the ISPCC management have refused to abide by the proposals put forward for settlement by the Labour Court. The Labour Court proposals were reasonable but apparently they were unacceptable to the management of the ISPCC because the ISPCC seem to be interested in nothing except total victory. It is difficult to understand or, indeed, to justify the carry-on of the management of the ISPCC over the past number of months. They precipitated the strike. They implied to their own employees that if the strike went ahead they would consider closing down the entire service and they have now proceeded to attempt to raise funds from the public as recently as two weekends ago by way of a church gate collection in my own city of Cork, by door to door fund raising by paid fund raisers and also by accepting grants from the State which were meant to be provided to enable them to provide a service for deprived families. Whatever about the fund raising from the public — and that raises serious ethical questions — there is a fundamental legal question raised by the apparent failure of the Government to ensure that the money provided by the State to the ISPCC is being used for the purpose intended.
There are two issues which arise here. The first is the incontrovertible fact that much of the money provided in the past by the Department of Health had been given — and I have seen the letters accompanying some of these grants — in order to contribute towards wage increases for employees of the ISPCC. This is what was specifically referred to in the correspondence from the Department of Health. Many, if not all, of these wage increases have not been paid to the employees of the ISPCC. Therefore, the question arises as to whether the money is being used in accordance with not just the wishes but, indeed, the decision of the Oireachtas as to how those funds should be used.
The second question relates to the utilisation of this year's grant from the Department of Health. Quite clearly for almost five months now the ISPCC have provided virtually no service. All of their centres are closed, all of their schools are closed and all of the other services they provide are not functioning.
It is difficult, therefore, to imagine how the grant being provided to them by the State can be used for the purpose for which it is intended. If no services are being provided it is very difficult to see how the grant can be used in the way that was intended. It is, therefore, not just a question of an industrial dispute any more: it is a question of the proper use of public funds. That is a matter for the Minister and the Government and no amount of hiding behind industrial relations legislation can escape that fact. What is at issue now is the use of public funds, funds which are subject to the audit of the Comptroller and Auditor General.
In order to encourage the Minister and the Government to take an interest in this area I wrote on 17 September to the Comptroller and Auditor General asking him to take an interest in this area. I am happy to report that he has told me that my concern has been noted and will be kept in mind in carrying out the current audit of the Department of Health. It is no longer, therefore, a matter of whether the Minister wishes to be involved or not. He may not wish to be and perhaps he does wish to be. Quite clearly, in order to satisfy the possible interest of the Comptroller and Auditor General it is the Minister's duty to deal with the ISPCC and to inquire of them formally as to how they are using their funds and, if necessary, to ensure that these funds are returned to the Department until such time as the Minister is satisfied that they are going to be used for the purpose for which they were intended which is to provide services and to pay a staff.
I take no pleasure in having to raise an issue involving a voluntary organisation in this fashion. I do not think anybody could enjoy the prospect of a substantial voluntary organisation being investigated. I am speaking as one who has a long history of involvement with a voluntary organisation. However, the ISPCC have shown such an extraordinary unwillingness to enter into serious negotiations and have issued such extraordinary demands to their employees that the Minister has good reason at this stage to believe that the will on the part of the executive and management of the ISPCC to seek a solution to this dispute is completely lacking.
In an ordinary strike the executive and the management have something to lose. For instance, in a profit making company the company will lose money. In this case there is no apparent loss to either the management or the executive members of this organisation and, therefore, there does not seem to be any external force other than the Minister which can put some pressure on them to negotiate a reasonable solution. The evidence is overwhelming that the employees have been, almost to a fault, reasonable in their position. They were willing to forego multiple thousands of pounds in back money because they understood the difficult financial position of the organisation. Nevertheless, the management shows no willingness to negotiate or talk to them.
By way of an example of the extraordinary demands of the management I am aware that one of the conditions they have sought from their employees is that all correspondence arriving at headquarters should be opened by management. This would include letters to employees from their union, perhaps letters to employees from their banks, perhaps letters to employees from their insurance companies which perhaps are addressed to the ISPCC headquarters. When an organisation make demands like that of their employees nobody seriously imagines that they are expecting these conditions to be met. One can easily imagine that what they are doing is putting unacceptable conditions up to prevent a solution being reached. If this is their objective then I think the Minister has got to take action. I have no doubt that if they wished to bring about a settlement they would not seek to have such extraordinary conditions imposed on their members.
I wonder, therefore, am I being too harsh in saying that what you are seeing is a group of people behaving like tin pot generals seeking to make a battlefield in which they win against a particularly vulnerable section of their own employees. That is what is really involved here. It seems to be a macho exercise in which people prove that they can deal with their own employees and the only person who can ensure that something different is the outcome is the Minister. The only way that the ISPCC executive and management can be persuaded to become flexible is if they face the prospect of their grant being withdrawn and indeed the quite serious and realistic possibility that if money provided for that organisation has been used in a way other than that voted by the Oireachtas then there would be a question of the personal liability of the executive for the misuse of public funds. It is a matter for the Minister to investigate matters like that and it is up to the Minister to use the leverage that he quite clearly has to make a breakthrough possible.
I hope the Minister will now tell this House that as a matter of urgency he proposes to raise with the ISPCC the question of what is being done with the funds that have been supplied by his Department this year and also what was done in previous years. The Government may wish and choose to ignore the industrial relations aspect of it but they have a legal obligation to ensure that public funds are used in accordance with the wishes of the Oireachtas. No member of the Government and no Government collectively can escape that responsibility. It is specifically referred to in the details of public expenditure in each year that the grants to the Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children is subject to audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General. It must, therefore, be spent in accordance with the wishes of the Oireachtas.
It is quite clear that if this society continues to fail to provide any service that the money cannot be spent in accordance with the wishes of the Oireachtas. The question of what is being done with the money, therefore, arises and what has been done in the past with the money. That is a matter for the Minister and I would appeal to him to urgently seek discussions with the executive of the ISPCC to inquire of them what is being done with this money. In the process of making that inquiry he should raise with the members of the executive the question of the need for this strike, its possible resolution and the urgency of resolving the dispute if for no other reason than because the personal position of the executive of the ISPCC in regard to the way public funds are being used will be called into question if they do not resolve this strike immediately. I look forward to the Minister's reply.
