The secondary school at the centre of the controversy surrounding jailed teacher Enoch Burke last year appointed a team of management consultants and a firm of financial advisers to review its operations and finances.
This is disclosed in recently filed accounts for Wilson Hospital School Co Ltd which show that the school’s insurance bill more than doubled in 2024 while its legal and professional bill increased sixfold.
The school recorded a surplus of €67,211 for 2024 and was sitting on an accumulated deficit of €61,073 at the end of last year.
The accounts show that the school firm’s insurance bill increased by 112 per cent from €65,230 to €138,966 in 2024, while the school’s legal and professional spend increased sixfold from €47,422 to €310,651.
RM Block
The spiralling insurance and professional and legal costs coincided with the school’s ongoing High Court dispute with Mr Burke concerning Mr Burke’s continued contempt of court.
Mr Burke is now in his fourth spell behind bars for breaching High Court orders requiring him to stay away from the Co Westmeath school.
Mr Burke has now spent more than 520 days in prison and has been fined €225,000 for contempt of court.
An adjudication hearing on costs associated with the cases was told earlier this week that the school’s insurers have paid the school’s own legal fees.
The school is a co-educational day and boarding school. Last year its revenues increased by 19 per cent from €3.38 million to €4.03 million and it recorded a surplus of €67,211. This followed the school recording a loss in 2023 of €139,938.
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The biggest driver in the school’s income in 2024 came from its boarding students, where ‘residential services income’ rose from €1.7 million to €2.84 million.
The school’s expenditure included ‘bad debts’ of €289,168.
The accounts made no reference to the Enoch Burke controversy.
The company’s cash funds last year increased from €25,187 to €170,757.
