Madam, – The “Bord Snip” report makes interesting reading in respect of the recommendations for significant increases in out of pocket costs if you are a sick person attending a hospital or in need of medications. It is particularly relevant in the context of a rise in my gross salary in May of €25,000 to €225,000 under the terms of the new contract for hospital doctors. The cost of implementation of the contract this year is reported to be €140 million.
It also seems absurd that this expenditure has been sanctioned by Government and executed by Prof Drumm, CEO of the HSE, when the Government and the CEO are witness both to cuts in Crumlin children’s hospital and to the work of managers in the HSE in Naas, who are currently forcing the most savage cuts in our public hospitals throughout the country, apparently without a care for the needs of patients or frontline staff trying to provide hospital services.
While it would appear that the terms of the contract must be legally fulfilled, one must question the morality of this in the context of the above facts. Somehow I thought, given the financial crisis, a mechanism would be found by Government to postpone or alter the financial terms of this contract through negotiation with consultant bodies, or if not, through Colm McCarthy’s public service report, whose terms of reference provided wriggle room for him to at least make some comment, if not recommendations in this regard. This thorny work, according to the report, is to be dealt with by the reconvened commission on pay for higher public servants.
I am increasingly despondent about the country’s political and health service governance. We are experiencing the worst financial crisis this country has ever seen, and yet Government can on the one hand allow a large increase in health expenditure on salaries for highly paid health service personnel, and on the other, through its health service executive arm, cut hospital and other health services to sick people. Its public service review body does not even refer to these facts, but at the same time, makes recommendations to cut social welfare payments to those at the bottom of the ladder.
Is all of this not outrageous? I think we might have had attempts at kidnapping of executives in the HSE or Government or had a revolution if this had happened in France! – Yours, etc,
Madam, – The McCarthy report identified cuts in excess of those required without addressing the issue of public sector pay. Adding the latter into the mix would suggest that there is ample scope for cost reduction of the magnitude required by the Minister for Finance.
Would it be too logical to suggest that he reinvest some of those cuts into job creation initiatives?
A redeployment of resources to the private sector would surely drive growth prospects far more quickly than keeping such resources in the public sector? It’s much easier to destroy than create – this might explain why the focus has been almost singularly on cuts to date?
The country needs a twin-track approach that stimulates private sector job creation in tandem with public sector cuts.
After all, the more employed in the private sector, the more we can afford the public sector.
A chara, – I saw Dr McCarthy on RTÉ saying that all areas of public spending were targeted in his “Bord Slash” report.
I have perused all two volumes but I seem to have missed the bit where cuts to large fees for private, right-wing economic consultants (many of whom cheer-led the boom and bust economics that caused our current plight) for producing dry reports recommending further impoverishment of the least well-off (who had a minimal role in getting us “where we are”).
Perhaps Dr McCarthy or his well-paid colleagues could guide me? – Is mise,
A chara, – Colm McCarthy’s proposals to deny the Irish language practical recognition and official support by inter alia abolishing the Department of the Gaeltacht, stopping the funding of Irish summer colleges and ending services in Irish such as bilingual publication of a very limited number of official documents would do much harm and make only marginal (if any) savings.
If we truly wish to become an English state, then let us treat for union with England, a nation from whom we could learn much regarding a sense of duty, love of country and of the common good. – Is mise,
Madam, – I agree with John Hughes (July 21st). “An Bord Snip Nua” is unbecoming and trivialises serious problems. Public Expenditure Review Committee, abbreviated to PERC and pronounced PERK, seems more appropriate. – Yours, etc,
Madam, — In supporting her call (“Theatre chief says plans for cutbacks in arts ‘incredible’,” July 20th) for continued arts funding in the face of the recommendations of the McCarthy report, one could reasonably advance the view that people such as Garry Hynes have done more for this country than any economist has.
That being the case, how is it that we put such a premium on the expertise of economists?
Why not have a committee of artists to recommend cost-saving measures in the area of private-sector senior management, for example? It would make no less sense than what we are doing now. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – Fintan O’Toole (Opinion, July 21st) states that the McCarthy report was part of a broader political agenda that “public servants and public spending are the root of the economic crisis”. I hear this argument being put forward all the time, but it seems to be missing the point. We’ve moved far beyond that stage now.
As I understand it, the McCarthy report was commissioned to look for ways to reduce public spending. No more no less. It won’t be the only means of restoring the public finances, but surely a lot of its proposals will have to be implemented. Public servants and public spending are not the root of the economic crisis. One of the causes is an over-reliance on the construction sector which generated huge revenues which were ploughed into unsustainable public spending. Another cause is reckless lending practices of banks. The fallout from the latter has exacerbated the outcome of the former.
However, there would still be a huge budget deficit due to the collapse of property market tax revenue even if the banks had acted responsibly and did not have to be bailed out, and the EU would still be telling us to get our house in order.
We couldn’t even have afforded the public service, including the acknowledged inefficiencies, in its present guise in that event and we certainly can’t now. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – Elaine Byrne (Opinion, July 21st), asks the following question: “Why did it take the McCarthy report to shatter tightly held assumptions about how pupil-teacher ratios were calculated?”. Ms Byrne must be one of the few people left in the country who doesn’t understand the difference between pupil-teacher ratio and average class size.
For the record, the pupil-teacher ratio at primary level in Ireland in 2006, the last year for which comparative figures are available through the OECD, was the second worst in the EU. The average class size in Irish primary schools in 2006 was also the second worst in the EU. We employ fewer teachers than almost any other country in the EU and Irish mainstream class teachers teach more children in their classes than almost any other teachers in the EU.
This is the base for the cuts proposed by the McCarthy report. The report, by deliberately omitting the effect its proposals would have on class size, is not an exercise in clarity; it is an exercise in spin. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – It is a cause of surprise and disappointment that “An Bord Snip” didn’t see good reason to recommend the abolition of the Central Bank and the ERSI. Both organisations cost millions annually to run and both have served our country very badly. – Yours, etc,