THE TRADE union Siptu has confirmed that one of the signatories to a bank account into which it is alleged more than €2.3 million in State funds was paid was one of its staff members.
The other signatory was a member of the union.
Siptu last night declined to identify the two individuals involved with the account into which an audit report found annual payments of €250,000 were made by the Department of Health, via the HSE.
The Irish Timeslast week revealed the money had been paid into a bank account under the name of the "Siptu national health and local authority levy fund".
An internal HSE audit has maintained that part of the funding paid into the overall €2.35 million fund had been used to finance some of the 31 foreign trips undertaken by officials of the HSE, the Department of Health, the Department of Finance, trade union representatives and others associated with the skill training programme.
Siptu said that independent external auditors Mazars had confirmed that the union did not receive payment of the €2.353 million. “They have also confirmed that the account, into which the payments appear to have been made, was not opened with the authorisation or approval of the appropriate authorities within the union.
“After Siptu was first contacted by the HSE auditors at the end of September last and having checked its accounts, Siptu advised them that it had not received the payments. The HSE internal auditors pointed Siptu to a bank account which bore the name of the union. After contacting the bank it was confirmed that the account was not part of the Siptu accounts managed by the branch in question”.
The union said it asked its staff member, who is on sick leave, to co-operate with the HSE audit unit, and he had readily agreed.
The HSE last night presented Siptu with replies to nine specific queries it had raised in relation to the payments. Earlier, Siptu had said it would take High Court action to secure a copy of the HSE’s internal audit report.
The HSE said it had also provided 69 pages of documentation – effectively elements of the internal audit report which relate to the union. It added that it had previously given this material to the union last autumn. It also said that it had given over an additional 12 pages of documentation.
The HSE also said that it had formally made a complaint to the Garda about public money that could not be accounted for. It is in the process of establishing an independent investigation into compliance of the skill programme with governance arrangements since 2005.
Last week The Irish Timesrevealed that no financial records for travel or hotel costs were kept for overseas health service staff training trips.
The audit found that expenditure for trips to the US, Australia, Hong Kong and the UK had been processed outside the Skill programme books of account. It said that an employee of a trade union had arranged and paid for the overseas travel for public and other officials and subsequently recouped the unvouched costs from Skill or funded it from the grant provided by the Department of Health.
The audit also maintained there were breaches of official public service and HSE recruitment policy regarding the skill training programme. It maintained that relatives of personnel associated with the programme were directed to a recruitment agency, which then placed two people on temporary contracts with the skill office.
The audit also found there were “differences of opinion” regarding the line management and supervision of the Skill project.