Duffy refuses to tell the MoS how much he was paid by St John of God
PRESIDENTIAL hopeful Gavin Duffy has refused to say how much he has earned working with the St John of God group – the charity which secretly paid millions of euro in top-ups to managers, while lying to the HSE to deny such payments.
Mr Duffy confirmed last night that he had worked with the SJOG group, saying he ran their biannual leadership conference from 1998 to 2012. ‘I also delivered communications and presentation skills training to the leadership team,’ he said. ‘Approximately every second year I provided two days’ leadership and presentation skills training.’
In the wake of the top-up controversy at SJOG several of that leadership team – including former CEO John Pepper – ceased working for the charity.
Asked how much he earned for this work, Mr Duffy said the issue related to ‘client confidentiality’ and should be directed to SJOG, which has previously declined to answer MoS questions about payments to Mr Duffy.
In contrast, Mr Duffy has revealed how much he has earned for work with others such as Enda Kenny for example. He said this week: ‘You can’t call for openness and transparency as I have, and then not be open and transparent, so I’m happy to answer any questions about who my business clients have been in the past.’ Mr Duffy denied that his work with SJOG ever involved advising the charity on how to discourage and prevent the spread of negative stories resulting from public interest investigations into concerns over SJOG. In addition to the top-up scandal, which saw the Government move to seek the return of some HSE monies that were inappropriately paid in top-ups, the charity was found to have covered up allegations of child abuse against a brother of the order.
That Brother, Aidan Clohessy, was then allowed to begin a new life in contact with children in Africa, while payouts were made to alleged victims back home.
Asked if he helped counter the spread of these stories, Mr Duffy said: ‘Certainly not. I never had any dealings with media or any journalists.’ However, a tweet from an SJOG staff suggests otherwise.
In the tweet, posted on the day the damning HSE audit into the top-up scandal was leaked to the media, the employee directly challenged Mr Duffy.
‘Gavin Duffy, you’re very quiet on the SJOG situation,’ the tweet read. ‘Not long ago you belittled/shouted at frontline staff, saying you protected us from the media.’
In a series of now deleted responses to the tweet, Mr Duffy said he was willing to apologise for any misunderstanding and sought a meeting with the employee.
When asked, Mr Duffy did not address the tweet directly.
Asked about the top-up revelations he said: ‘I believe all payments funded by the Exchequer or the HSE have to be open, transparent and audited.’ He declined to comment on the case of Brother Clohessy, saying: ‘I have no knowledge of the particular case{s). To my knowledge I have never met a Brother Aidan Clohessy.’