Sir, – John McManus’s article, with its admonition that it’s time for the Government to pay up after the many years of McVerry doing the work of Government, is a refreshing take on the housing crisis (“Peter McVerry Trust has been bailing the Government out for a decade. It’s time the favour was repaid”, Opinion & Analysis, November 14th).
I have always wondered why Government thinks it’s a good idea for charities to do a task that is such an important but basic need for society ?
We see this also in certain sectors of health services as well.
There are more than 450 approved housing bodies tasked with doing what the Government should be doing. All are run by volunteers, with a handful of larger ones having professional staff.
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Do these volunteer charities really have better technical, financial and governance skills than local or national government?
Many are small local initiatives plugging obvious gaps left by local or national government, which are happy to switch from being a obligated provider to being a provider of red tape and regulatory oversight. The cynicism of the Government “approving” such bodies, along with very onerous but necessary governance responsibilities, shows how far the narrative has developed to hide governments shirking of its responsibility. If the McVerry charity is struggling then it does not bode well for the other volunteer charities doing similar but necessary Government work. – Yours, etc,
JOHN O’CONNELL,
Letterkenny,
Co Donegal.
Sir, – John McManus is very generous with taxpayers’ money when he demands that the Government would underwrite the finances of the Peter McVerry Trust. There is nothing wrong with governments working with NGOs to implement social policy. We have many examples of this in Ireland outside of housing without it being attributed to government failure. What we expect is that these NGOs manage their businesses correctly. I have no knowledge of what lies behind the financial travails of the McVerry Trust but it would have been helpful if your article put us at ease on this aspect before rushing to judgment. – Yours, etc,
WILLIAM DONNELLY,
Galway.