Responding to news that the HSE is implementing a pause on the recruitment of non-frontline roles in some regions due to overspends, Social Democrats TD P\u00e1draig Rice has called on the Minister for Health to implement the Programme for Government commitment to a multi-annual approach to health funding.<\/p>\n
Deputy Rice, who is the party\u2019s health spokesperson, said:<\/p>\n
\u201cMulti-annual funding has been promised by each government since 2016 but it has still not been delivered. Reverting to austerity era measures is not the answer to these repeated overspends.<\/p>\n
\u201cMulti-annual funding would provide certainty for services, better capacity planning, and improved accountability. This measure is fundamental to the long-term reform of our health system under Sl\u00e1intecare.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis latest embargo is a knee-jerk response that was taken without any consultation with unions.<\/p>\n
\u201cI do, however, welcome new controls on agency spending. This is desperately needed to reduce this spiralling spend and meet the 2026 Service Plan target of reducing agency costs to below \u20ac720 million \u2013 which should be seen as a very modest target.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut we know that over \u20ac900 million was spent on agency staff last year, while since 2020, over \u20ac4 billion has gone on agency staff costs. I accept that there will always be a place for some agency staff but this spend cannot be justified. It is a shocking use of public money, and it is terribly short-sighted.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know that many agency workers are desperate for permanent contracts. But even the modest target of converting 960 agency posts into permanent positions across 2024 and 2025 had still not been met by the end of last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the end of December, the HSE was 132 posts short, the bulk of which \u2013 77 posts \u2013 were in nursing and midwifery.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s time for the Minister for Health and the Minister for Public Expenditure to step up and finally deliver multi-annual funding of our health service. The Minister for Health must also scrap arbitrary recruitment caps which are compromising patient care and staff safety and wellbeing.\u201d<\/p>\n
May 7, 2026<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Responding to news that the HSE is implementing a pause on the recruitment of non-frontline roles in some regions due to overspends, Social Democrats TD P\u00e1draig Rice has called on the Minister for Health to implement the Programme for Government commitment to a multi-annual approach to health funding. Deputy Rice, who is the party\u2019s health […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":16408,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,726,642,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","category-hse","category-padraig-rice","category-press-release"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n