"The fear is that will lead to a crisis of confidence in the charity sector, because since the announcement in July, people have been asking a thousand questions, including whether such embezzlement could happen in other institutions, because it could have happened in a foundation as robust and established as Caritas", LSAP MP explained to the press on Friday 30 August.

Fayot, the chairwoman of the LSAP parliamentary group, , and MP , tabled a bill to adapt and supplement current legislation. "The idea, through our bill, is really to do something to prevent and cure this loss of confidence", they added.

Strengthening the law of 7 August 2023

In practical terms, the LSAP parliamentary group's bill would supplement the law of 7 August 2023 on associations and foundations. It would introduce a "more restrictive ex ante approval mechanism for operations exceeding €10,000 (four-eyes principle), and even €100,000 (eight-eyes principle), with a real and documented exchange between directors and managers each time", the text states.

So the law of 7 August 2023, passed under the former DP-LSAP-déi Gréng government, didn't go far enough? "There was nothing about specific organisations that collect donations from the public or benefit from public funding, which set out rules for four-eyes or eight-eyes, or for delegation to the board of directors when the sums involved are substantial", Fayot replied. "We could not have foreseen such fraud, but once it has happened, you can strengthen your defences.”

Strengthening transparency

"The idea is not to say that the law of 7 August 2023 is a bad law, because it isn't, it does in fact provide for reporting mechanisms for large NGOs, and we also know that organisations under agreement are regularly audited for their governance. In this case, we need to increase transparency and introduce mechanisms to detect this kind of fraud,” he stated.

The proposed law also provides that "when a series of operations involves a commitment of €500,000 within a short period of four weeks, additional security is provided by a meeting of the board of directors deliberating on this series of operations which together represent a significant scale".

While he does not wish to "lay the blame at the door of the current government, which is in the middle of a crisis", when asked what his previous coalition would have done in a similar situation, Fayot did say that " (CSV) should communicate more and be more transparent with parliament". Alongside its proposed law, the LSAP is also calling for the Court of Auditors to carry out more stringent checks on associations and foundations with funding agreements, and for compliance clauses to be systematically included in all state funding agreements.

Read coverage of the LSAP’s press conference in French