By: Michael O’Farrell
Investigations Editor
THE St John of God charity was just four weeks from running out of money and considered defaulting on Revenue payments this summer, the Irish Mail on Sunday can reveal.
Despite the charity facing imminent collapse, five executives went on a training trip to Florida in June – at a cost of €23,000.
The MOS can further reveal that bosses at the charity made a fresh mystery payout to a recently departed executive – even as the HSE continues to investigate €1.6m in secret top-ups to others at the group.
The new €24,000 payout, agreed on September 30, came just months after the MOS exposed the €1.6m paid to 14 senior managers without the knowledge or permission of the HSE.
Meanwhile, two shocking Hiqa reports reveal that St John of God left intellectually disabled residents living in fear as they were repeatedly assaulted, spat at, slapped and subjected to inappropriate sexual behaviour.
The reports severely criticise management at the charity for failing to protect residents from harm. News of the disturbing plight faced by some residents comes as the MoS reveals the dire financial state of the charity, with internal HSE documents showing the group was four weeks from running out of cash this summer and considered defaulting on Revenue payments.
The MoS can further reveal that:
- Bosses used funds allocated for pensions to keep services going in 2015 – a practice the HSE has instructed the charity to cease.
- The group has a €2.7m deficit in its pension funds and, in the view of HSE bosses, has the worst pension problems of all funded-agencies.
- In addition to the €24k September payout, bosses at the charity passed a special resolution to indemnify themselves from any consequences of making the payment.
Yet last night the charity refused to explain why a new payout had been made – and why it was necessary to indemnify those involved.
The HSE was unable to confirm whether it knew of the extra €24k payment. Meanwhile, minutes of meetings between the charity’s managers and HSE bosses have emerged showing that St John of God repeatedly asked the taxpayer for advances and additional funding – even as bosses paid themselves the controversial secret top-ups.
Despite these and other financial concerns, bosses – including CEO John Pepper and second-in-command Clare Dempsey – have continued to justify their top-ups and have refused to pay back any funds.
Mr Pepper, who has been largely absent from HQ for the past month, earns €182,000, paid directly from the St John of God order.
Ms Dempsey’s salary of €125,000 – more than the €110,000 maximum allowed by the HSE for the role she occupies – is paid with HSE funds.
Despite savage cutbacks to services, Mr Pepper and five other senior managers travelled to a Catholic health conference in Florida at the beginning of June. The trip came only two weeks before the charity announced that it was withdrawing services at St Augustine’s centre for teenagers with intellectual disabilities in south Dublin, due to a ‘significant reduction in funding’ – a move that has since been reversed.
The €23k Florida trip – which was funded by the John of God order – was justified by the charity management even though, weeks after returning, they sought a €4m ‘acceleration’ (advance) from the HSE as they ran out of money.
The acceleration request was made in a meeting on June 29, by the charity bosses – including Ms Dempsey and finance director Annamarie McGill who had just returned from Florida.
Minutes of that meeting show that when the advance was refused, Ms McGill told the HSE the charity had a €6m overdraft and would run out of cash in four weeks.
As a result, the charity was considering options such as defaulting on Revenue payments, seeking a loan or an overdraft increase.
Two weeks after the June 29 meeting between St John of God bosses And the HSE, Hiqa inspectors encountered shocking conditions at a residential facility run by the charity.
The inspectors concluded that management and governance failures at St John of God – had left vulnerable residents at the charity’s St Raphael’s Centre in Celbridge, Co. Kildare, facing ‘aggressive and sexualised behaviour’ and ‘acts of physical and verbal aggression’. The designated person responsible for the facility is Phil Gray – one of those who weeks earlier had travelled to Florida.
Ms Gray was also among those who shared in the secret €1.6m topup payments.
Ms Gray was preceded as the person responsible for St Raphael’s by Clare Dempsey.
In addition to revealing the secret top-up payments at the charity further investigations by this newspaper have detailed how Mr Pepper, as CEO, has at least five family members employed at or providing paid services to the charity.
One of the roles occupied by Mr Pepper’s family – a position as head of maintenance at the charity’s St Mary’s campus at Drumcar Co. Louth – was awarded to the charity chief’s younger brother Seamus Pepper in 2006.
John Pepper’s son – also called John – became head of human resources at Drumcar two years ago, while his wife Catherine is paid to provide therapy services on a freelance basis at the centre.
Last month it emerged that HSE auditors investigating the €1.6m in secret payments had no choice but to delay plans for a meeting with Mr Pepper because they were told he would be out of the country on business.
However, Mr Pepper never left the country and was photographed attending training sessions of his local GAA team ahead of a league final they subsequently lost.
It is understood that, since then, Mr Pepper has been on sick leave and is not expected to return before Christmas.
Now at an advanced stage, the HSE probe is understood to be focused on a number of strands such as the credit card expenditure incurred by certain managers, including Mr Pepper.
