Results 261-280 of 1,046,415 for in 'Dáil debates' OR (speaker:Ciarán Cuffe OR speaker:Marc Ó Cathasaigh OR speaker:Neasa Hourigan OR speaker:Bernard Durkan OR speaker:Martin Heydon OR speaker:Réada Cronin) in 'Committee meetings'
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Bernard Durkan: They are gone. I could go for another ten minutes if the Chair wants me to.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Bernard Durkan: I know the Chair is anxious that I would-----
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Bernard Durkan: I am finished.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: I will start by adding my congratulations to Mr. Mitchell, and also by recognising the work that has been completed on the waiting lists, and the effort going into it in the face of increasing demand. I know that is not a small challenge. I want to follow up on the issue of targets and estimated savings but I want to look back a little bit to the recruitment freeze. My first question is...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: Okay but we were increasing at a percentage point and we can track that on a graph somewhere, say what the percentage increase was and estimate what the saving was, can we not?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: We will come to staffing ceilings in a moment but I expect we would have a sense of what the recruitment freeze did in terms of savings and efficiencies.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: Okay. We can argue whether it is an opportunity cost but we should have a sense of what that number would have been if we had not put the recruitment freeze in place.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: Mr. Mulvany has all the calculations so he could do that. He has all the numbers at his fingertips. He could do that calculation and tell us.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: An indicative view. An estimate.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: Okay.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: Okay, and since, is it mid-July that it was lifted?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: Since then, what has been the increase in staffing, or have we tracked that with regard to the data?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: I have heard people responding to that. We will come to need in a second but I will first return to agency and overtime, which Mr. Gloster just talked about. Perhaps this is a question for the Department as well. I believe we all generally support this push for savings and productivity. Is what Mr. Gloster just described how the number for the staffing ceiling was arrived at?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: I am not sure whether this is a question for the Department or the HSE but will Mr. Gloster outline the policy as it applies to a particular unit, whether a maternity unit, a mental health unit or whatever, when there are new roles coming along and new recruitment happening and where roles have been staffed by an agency staff person for quite a long time? In a world where there are finite...
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: May I ask a follow-up there? What does "reduce" mean? Does it mean to make those people permanent and bring them within the HSE family or does it mean to get rid of them?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: Will that agency conversion be a long-term project? It seems we are staffing a significant number of long-term jobs.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: My question is not so much about the time it takes to do it. I presume there are more than 500 staff in this position.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: That is for the Department to answer, then.
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: That is very clear. Will the Department respond to that point? Will it also respond as regards its position on the conversion of agency staff?
- Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Productivity and Savings Task Force: Discussion (18 Sep 2024)
Neasa Hourigan: The Department of Health is identifying particular posts that have a high cost----