HSE West no longer in charge of budget
Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers has withdrawn day-to-day spending powers from the HSE West and North-West region.
The news that HSE West and North West is no longer to be in charge of its own budget has come as no surprise to councillors from Mayo who are members of the regional health forum.
Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers revealed told The Irish Times Inside Politics podcast last week that he was withdrawing day-to-day spending powers from four HSE regions, describing their overspend as “completely unacceptable”. It is understood the four regions are the West and North West, the South West, Dublin South East and Dublin and Midlands regions. There are six HSE regions in total.
“They’re going to lose autonomy on day-to-day spending and there’ll be much greater controls introduced on all elements of pay and non-pay spending,” he said.
Reacting to the news, Castlebar-based Independent Cllr Michael Kilcoyne, who was recently elected chairperson of the HSE Regional Health Forum Committee for the West and Northwest, said the move will only lead to fewer staff in the HSE and fewer services.
“It all comes back to government and policy, not allocating sufficient budget funding to health in the first place. Meanwhile, the HSE structure itself is over-managed, with too much red tape and bureaucracy.”
Describing the HSE as a massive organisation with almost 150,000 staff, he said: “There’s a manager for everything and another manager under them, and then each of them has a secretary and a couple of advisers.
"They need to modernise the hospital system. People are walking around with a file under their arm looking for another file. That should be all on the screen in front of them."
Cllr Kilcoyne said to spend money, management must get approval for everything, including employing staff.
“The government cannot just turn around and say, you are getting X amount of millions to sort things. They must be prepared to manage it as well. These are hospitals they are running, not sweet shops. Instead, what we see is so much money squandered."
He said the fault did not lie with HSE staff.
“Their job is to look after people who are sick and to do that, they need staff, facilities and so many other things, but there is just no space. Basically, the service the HSE gives is poor. Look at the number of mistakes that have been made and the millions in costs paid out in compensation each year.”
Ultimately, the Independent councillor says it all comes down to politics and people being responsible for their vote, stating: “Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael decided to go into government together. This is what you get. There is no real opposition. They are cutting expenditure now so that in two years’ time, before the next election, they will increase it again. Yet the same people are being elected again and no heads will roll.
"I always say that the people must take responsibility because it is they who give them the authority to work on their behalf.”
Cathaoirleach of Mayo County Council and Health Forum member Cllr John Caulfield agreed that bureaucracy is a main stumbling block.
“This week alone I waited almost five hours for somebody to get a letter to release them from hospital. There is a lot of that mismanagement and just no joined up thinking.”
He believes the old health board system was the best where people had an input locally.
“The problem now is the connection between the public and government is being eroded all the time. I would love to go back to the matron system where they were responsible for wards and for discharge. But there’s nobody in charge now, everything is subcontracted out and while you have that there is going to be mismanagement.”
Whether the Minister’s decision is the right move or not, he suggests: “Certainly something has to be done because what is happening is not working. We are firing money out but not getting the results. Our queues aren’t getting any shorter so we really need to look at it and maybe go hospital by hospital. The needs of Mayo, with an older population, are different from other hospitals.”
- Published as part of the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme.
