REHAB CHIEF EXECUTIVE Mo Flynn has defended her salary, saying she believes it is comparable to other public sector charity jobs.
The former CEO of Our Lady’s Hospice took on the role from Angela Kerins, who resigned in April 2014 citing the toll numerous controversies had taken on her and her family.
Several revelations were made about the organisation’s finances and Kerins was forced to acknowledge a personal salary of €240,000.
The salary for Flynn was reduced to €140,000, with several members of senior management taking pay cuts.
Speaking this morning to The Marian Finucane Show on RTÉ Radio 1, Flynn said she hasn’t made any attempt to negotiate a pay increase.
“It was the salary that was set before I actually came into the organisation,” she said.
When questioned by Áine Lawlor on whether she would reduce it, she said:
I think you’ve got to look at the scale of the job. There’s over three and a half thousand employees, we’re operating in five different jurisdictions, 250 different places. There’s a heck of a lot of management responsibility and accountability involved in delivering that.
Personally, it’s comparable to salaries in other public sector charitable jobs doing similar work for the size of the job. So I wouldn’t be expecting that it would increase, I’m not doing that, but I think it’s comparable in terms of what the requirements of the job is.
Flynn said she took on the role after she “saw beyond all that was going on”, describing the organisation and its work as “amazing”.
“That’s what resonates with me,” she said.
However, Rehab has been hit with a significant reduction in fundraising income, in the region of 35%, which has had a “serious impact” on the delivery of services.
Flynn said the work has continued, and has focused on boosting co-ordination of local services to ensure the people who need specialist services can access them.
She described the need to get people with disabilities who can live independently into their own homes, but added that Rebab was encountering difficulties in terms of the rental market and also the public’s attitude.
“It’s been a challenge we hadn’t quite anticipated, but it’s one we had to deal,” Flynn said, describing people’s apprehensive to having someone with a disability coming to live in their community as “fear of the unknown”.
She called for people to embrace the ‘fantastic’ opportunity living independently can offer someone in this situation.
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