Civil servants call health recruitment targets ‘batsh*t’

Civil servants described health recruitment targets as “batsh*t”, and said current targets are “incredible” and not in “anyway realistic”, a whistleblower has claimed in documents given to an Oireachtas committee.

The tranche of documents were given to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC). The author claims they reflect conversations which took place in the Department of Health, regarding budgetary issues in the Health Service Executive.

The person in question is the same civil servant, Shane Corr, whose disclosures led to reports last year that the Department of Health had been maintaining dossiers of medical and educational information on children involved in dormant court cases against the State.

In one document, an official tells another civil servant that targets were set for recruitment “when we’ve got all this additional money and recruitment targets were batsh*t”. Increased budgetary allocations were made for the Department of Health and HSE during the pandemic to drive the hiring of extra personnel.

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According to the disclosure, which is presented as “careful verbatim notes” of a briefing for a senior civil servant, a second official replies: “When you say ‘were’ – are. The fact that they’re put out as anyway realistic is incredible.” They go on to discuss the allocation of budget for home support hours.

Mr Corr told The Irish Times that he wanted to be invited before the Health Committee or PAC to discuss his disclosures. “I think it’s in the public interest, and there’s a whole lot more like it.” He said he was confident he could back up his disclosures fully.

The HSE had no comment on the documents, and the Department of Health did not respond to a request for comment. The health committee will this week hear from HSE chief executive Paul Reid and Robert Watt, the secretary general of the Department of Health.

Sláintecare

While it is likely members will raise the issues referenced, the committee chair Séan Crowe said he would be keeping the meeting closely on the topic of Sláintecare, the plan to reform the health service, which it has been convened to address. “If people are asking, it’ll have to be on the basis of Sláintecare,” he told The Irish Times.

Róisín Shortall, the Social Democrats co-leader, who is a member of the health committee, says she intends to raise the documents as they pertain to the financial management of the health service and key issues like staff hiring.

“The first thing is to have financial accountability, which is patently not there at the moment.” Her party colleague and fellow co-leader, Catherine Murphy said she expects the issue to be raised at the PAC, and that she is “absolutely” taking it seriously.

Brian Stanley, the Sinn Féin TD and chair of the PAC, said the intention is to have the HSE and Department in again and to “tease out these matters to see what the issues are”, and would be seeking to explore the matters alleged in the documents.

Meanwhile, Mr Reid has said there is “no black hole” in the HSE’s budget and there would be no adjustment of “hundreds of million” of euro this year.

He was referring to claims reported by the Business Post newspaper at the weekend, which referenced tapes made of civil servants – without their knowledge – discussing budgetary and recruitment issues.

Mr Reid said the report was not reflective of reality.

“In terms of finance issues, we have a very strong oversight of our board, by the audit and risk committee . . . combined with the Department of Health,” he said. “They’re two shared issues we’re working on . . . it won’t be in the region of the hundreds of million, if there is any.”

Mr Reid said the reported comments do not “reflect the very strong focus we have on all aspects of finance in the HSE.” Taoiseach Micheál Martin said claims that the HSE had fake hiring targets and sloppy financial reporting did not “reflect the reality on the ground”.

Mr Martin said there had been “record recruitment” in the organisation over the past two years and the health service had an “enormous budget”.