Ms Laverne McGuinness:

I will deal with Senator Colm Burke's question on management and administration staff and the regularisation of some posts. First, many of those management and administration posts are front-line posts. The holders are people who are seeing and making appointments for outpatient clinics and inpatient clinics, etc. These posts are included in our management and administration numbers, which are not simply about back-office staff. Overall, we have reduced by more than 2,000 staff in that category when one takes into account other agencies the HSE has subsumed. In 2009, a Government decision was made placing a moratorium on recruitment and on promotion. While we have lost more than 2,000 such staff during that time, there are key roles that obviously must be performed, some of which were at a more senior grade. For example, someone in a more junior grade, such as a clerical officer at grade 3, might have been assigned to a post that was vacant in a busy outpatient clinic at grade 4 - there is a lot of responsibility there - to carry out that function and task. However, that person would not have been given any additional money to do it. In other words, such people would have been so assigned, on their existing pay and arrangements, for a period of up to two to three years. Under the greater broader framework of the Haddington Road agreement, part of the negotiating process concluded that were somebody in a position like that, that is, covering unpaid for a significant period of over two years unpaid, he or she would be established in that post. In other words, that post would be regularised because there was no opportunity to externally advertise in respect of any promotional posts.