This is staggering.
A report by RTÉ Investigates has shown the degree to which the founder of the suicide charity Console and his family used funds from the organisation to finance their lavish lifestyle.
Paul Kelly recently resigned as the CEO of Console after an RTÉ Investigates programme titled Broken Trust showed irregularities in the charity’s finances and how accounts were altered to obscure how the directors of the company were paid, and how they received other benefits.
Now, RTÉ Investigates – which has seen a draft copy of the HSE audit into Console’s financial affairs – can reveal that Kelly, his wife Patricia and their son Tim received almost €500,000 in salaries and cars between 2012 and 2014.
Moreover, the trio used 11 company credit cards in the same time period in which almost another €500,000 was spent on groceries, designer clothes and foreign trips.
Those credit cards were used for…
- Trips to Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and other destinations
- Designer clothes from Hugo Boss and Ralph Lauren, among others
- Tickets to the Rugby World Cup
- Dental work
- Groceries, totalling €24,659 over three years
- Restaurants – between them, the trio spent €32,900 on eating out between 2012 and 2014
According to RTÉ Investigates, ‘other financial concerns raised in the audit was the issue of expense claims not being signed as approved, hand written receipts on scraps of paper were provided to support claims. Petty cash expenditure was not vouched, not balanced, not reconciled and was not signed off as correct.’
This chart shows the total credit card expenditure of the trio between 2012 and 2014.
RTÉ Investigates also reveals how there was little segregation of duties within the organisation, and how Paul Kelly ‘controlled all the operations of the organisation including opening the post.
‘Controls around receipting donations and fundraising were lax and non-existent. Console did not maintain a receipts book, there was no record listing all amounts received and money received was not lodged intact into Console’s bank account.’
RTÉ Investigates put this chart together based on the overall figures within the HSE audit.
According to The Irish Times, Kelly returned to work on Monday at Console despite his recent resignation in the light of last week’s RTÉ documentary.
He reportedly told staff in Celbridge that it was “business as usual,” while the HSE said it was “not clear” who was speaking for the charity.
No formal appointments to replace Kelly and the two family members – who had resigned with him – had yet been made, even though the remaining Console board members had accepted his decision to step down.
While three directors remain on the board, the Times reports that none of those three people have been closely involved in the running of the charity since their appointment two years ago.
The HSE has provided more than €2.5m to Console in recent years and is expected to review its funding arrangement. This is as a result of the audit they conducted into the business, founded by Paul Kelly in 2002.
Main image via RTÉ
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