Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda is spending millions of euro on agency staff without confirming they have Garda or medical clearance or have training in health and safety, according to a HSE audit.
The Co Louth hospital is also breaching HSE rules by failing to use a competitive process to select some of the recruitment agencies it deals with and putting in place a service level agreement as required.
The process for recruiting and paying for agency staff requires strengthening in significant areas and the effectiveness of internal controls is limited, according to the audit report.
Separately, other HSE internal audits released under freedom of information legislation show:
- A hospital consultant received overtime payments of nearly €70,000 for working for another part of the HSE;
- A manager appointed on an interim basis to a hospital group on a €45,000 contract ended up receiving nearly €275,000 when the scope of the role was widened and its duration extended
- A total of 138 retired employees were paid a salary by HSE South despite repeated instructions by senior managers that hiring of former staff should cease. One was overpaid by €33,000 when his pension was not stopped.
The audit of Our Lady of Lourdes showed the requirement to fill out a request form where a post was being filled by agency staff was not fulfilled in the 25 cases examined. Documentation Meanwhile, the rates charged by the agency were not always verified against supporting documentation. The hospital spent €16.8 million on agency staff in 2013, up from €12.6 million the previous year.
While service level agreements were in place with the two companies that provide the majority of agency staff to the hospital, this was not the case with two other companies which have been paid €3.8 million in the past six years.
Hospitals are increasingly reliant on agency staff because of restrictions on recruitment and a failure to attract candidates for permanent posts after years of salary cuts. However, agency workers paid on an hourly basis end up being far costlier than permanent staff.Drogheda has higher agency costs than any other hospital.
Nationally, €238 million was spent on agency staff in 2013.
