Sir, – The Department of Health, to much fanfare, has released its latest attempt to address hospital waiting lists in its 2022 waiting list action plan. This offering claims that €350 million will be allocated to the HSE and National Treatment Purchase Fund to reduce waiting lists by 18 per cent this year. The plan is to be governed by a task force under the Department of Health secretary general and the CEO of the HSE.
This plan, sadly, says nothing about how, when, or indeed where medical professionals will be recruited to address these waiting lists.
This plan is glossy and no doubt well intentioned but, given the scale of unfilled medical consultant posts, it’s hard to see how it will be achieved. Working for the HSE is simply not attractive for many skilled medical professionals. A “plan” to address waiting lists which contains no details on how medical professionals will be recruited to address those waiting lists risks accusations of being little more than a piece of marketing fluff.
A second notable function of the plan is that no sanction is proposed where targets aren’t met.
Indeed, one of the biggest issues with our health service is that while frontline doctors and nurses are subject to regulatory body oversight and potentially face public fitness to practice hearings for failures, permanent health service management in both the HSE and Department of Health do not appear to be subject to any independent oversight whatsoever. In the event that the targets are not met and waiting lists continue to grow, what consequences will there be for the secretary general and HSE CEO?
Regrettably, the document contains nothing on this issue.
Given the large taxpayer-funded pay increases given to both the HSE CEO and secretary general in recent times, one would at least expect to see not just targets but also consequences of failing to hit these targets.
Should they manage to eliminate waiting lists,the salary increases will have been money well spent; however, if waiting lists continue to grow, there must be consequences for the HSE CEO and department secretary general.
The Irish taxpayer should not be expected to simply give ever increasing sums to permanent health service management without expecting anything in return. – Yours, etc,
RUARY MARTIN,
Sandyford,
Dublin 18.