The North / South Language Body Annual Report & Accounts 2009

Arising from that, an agreement was reached under the auspices of theLabour Relations Commission that eight posts for Dublin and Gaoth Dobhairand eight current vacancies in the Dublin office would be announced togetherand these were advertised in December 2009.TrainingTraining sessions were organised for the staff on aspects of the work of Forasna Gaeilge and people at every level in the organisation took part in relevanttraining courses.Funding, Monitoring and Financial SystemsForas na Gaeilge’s daily needs continued to be served as the principal funderof the Irish language sector and the security of the monitoring systemsinvolved in the funding processes was confirmed. The reporting functions inthe computerised financial system were used to attend to specific questionsconnected with improvement of planning and expenditure internally – forexample, an expenditure profile – and in respect of dealing with the SponsorDepartments. Additional information concerning grants was provided to theBoard and to Board Committees under various headings.Risk AssessmentThe risk register continued to be used as the central planning tool of riskassessment at Board level in comparison to other tools which are developed –for example, new financial reporting processes. The Risk Register isexamined at least quarterly in light of developments in various areas inaccordance with good practice.Corporate RegulationIn respect of internal business processes, the corporate regulation of Foras naGaeilge was monitored in light of the appropriate provisions in the twojurisdictions.Freedom of InformationForas na Gaeilge operates the Freedom of Information Code of Practice sinceit was fully and officially implemented at the begining of February 2006.Two requests under the Code were received in 2009. The two requests wereapproved in part but there were parts of them which were not approved forcertain reasons – the commercially sensitive information, for example.ReportingDuring 2009, Foras na Gaeilge complied with its reporting obligations underthe financial memorandum to make documents available at mandated times.In the case of documents which had been approved by the appropriateauthorities, those documents were made available on the websitewww.gaeilge.ie . Below is a summary of reporting matters:The 2008 Annual Report and Accounts were submitted to the SponsorDepartments on schedule.A draft of the 2010 Business Plan was prepared and submitted to theSponsoring Departments on schedule.Research and International Good PracticeEuropean Federation of National Institutions for LanguageForas na Gaeilge has been registered as a member of the European Federationof National Institutions for Language, EFNIL, since 2005. EFNIL facilitates41