Catherine Byrne (Dublin South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Bill provides for a ten-person board, specifically the chairperson, the deputy chairperson and eight ordinary members. The amendment would require the eight ordinary members to include a patient advocate, a financial expert and two clinical experts. I understand the Deputy’s thinking on this amendment but the view of the Minister is that the best approach is as set out in the Bill as it stands. Members appointed by the Minister to the HSE board must be people who, in his or her opinion, have sufficient experience and expertise relating to matters connected with the HSE's functions to enable them to make a substantial contribution to the effective and efficient performance of those functions. The Bill provides for patient advocacy experience or expertise on the board. This meets the recommendation made by Dr. Gabriel Scally in his scoping review.

In line with the 2014 guidelines on appointments to State boards, vacancies on the board are advertised through the Public Appointments Service, PAS. The particular requirements required for membership of the board are set out in the PAS campaign.

The recent campaign for membership of the board sought candidates with experience and expertise in a number of areas including corporate governance, clinical governance, quality assurance and patient safety, strategic planning and change management or business management skills, financial planning and management, patient advocacy, strategic human resource management and public communications.

A key role of the chair of a State board is to identify the needs of the board for new skills, competencies or experience to ensure that it can effectively perform its role. It is desirable that board members have a mix of competencies rather than specific competencies.

The amendment proposed is, therefore, to the Minister's mind, not required as there is a process to ensure the required skill set and competencies for the board of the HSE.