The CEO of a charity accused of wrongly making payments totalling more than €84,000 to two former trustees has brought a High Court challenge to findings of a report by the charities' regulator.
Barbara Flynn, currently suspended as head of Ataxia Ireland, claims the report, published last July, was unfair and was compiled in breach of fair procedures.
She says regulator inspectors spoke to two disgruntled trustees who later set up their own rival charity and there was a failure to interview other trustees.
Among the conclusions of the regulator’s report were that payments totalling €84,009 to founding trustees Clare and Tim Creedon — Ms Flynn’s parents — were contrary to the Revenue Commissioners’ stated position on payments for other than reasonable out-of-pocket expenses.
The charity also had weak internal financial controls and Ms Flynn’s pension contribution of €38,500 was paid from funds rather than deducted from her salary, the report found.
On Monday, Peter Leonard BL, for Ms Flynn, secured leave to bring judicial review proceedings against the Charities Regulatory Authority over the report.
Ms Flynn has since 2005 been CEO of the charity, which assists people suffering from the ataxia brain condition affecting co-ordination, balance and speech, counsel said.
In 2016, two inspectors from the regulator’s office were appointed to carry out the investigation in relation to compliance with Revenue requirements and payments to trustees, counsel said.
However, counsel said, the investigation focused on the evidence of a “narrow” band of trustees between 2014 and 2015 who had subsequently set up their own rival charity. The inspectors did not talk to trustees from other eras who would have provided a different account, he said.
Despite this, the report made findings dating back to 2008, he said.
It was Ms Flynn’s case the regulator prejudged the matter on the basis of a tip-off from the disgruntled trustees and the report was not prepared in accordance with fair procedures and natural justice.
The report, which has been the subject of significant media attention, was damaging to his client who says that at all times she acted in the best interests of the charity, he said.
Mr Justice Noonan said the matter could come back before the court in January.
In a statement last September saying she intended bringing legal proceedings, Ms Flynn said that, in relation to the payments to her parents, the report failed to give “due weight” to statements from committee members who, she claims, said they knew of those payments.
She said her parents initially worked for the charity on an entirely voluntary basis for almost 25 years and 13 years respectively. The payments, from 2012, worked out at about €82.50 weekly for Clare Creedon and €150 weekly for Tim Creedon, she said.
The payments were fully transparent, went through payroll and were accounted for in annual statements, she said.