Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Independent)

I announced last week that the Government had decided to fund a special voluntary early retirement and severance package in the health sector. The scheme is aimed at management and administrative staff and support grades.

There is general acceptance of the need to reduce the numbers of management and administrative staff in the health service and I have referred to this on many occasions. For that reason the Government has decided to make €400 million available this year for a specific, targeted voluntary early retirement and severance package for the health service. Applications from management and administrative staff will be prioritised over those from support staff and will be approved automatically subject to the overall expenditure cap of €400 million not being breached. This is not the first initiative aimed at reducing numbers. The number of management and administrative staff , for example, has already fallen by over 1,000 since its peak in September 2007.

I am happy to say that there has been a very high level of interest in the new scheme. As of yesterday, there had been over 8,550 expressions of interest. Management and administrative staff accounted for over 5,300 of that total and support staff accounted for 3,250. Of course, not everyone who expresses an interest in the scheme will apply. The HSE will not know the actual intentions of staff until the closing date for applications, 19 November.

The purpose of the scheme is to achieve a permanent reduction in the numbers employed in the public health service. The scheme is confined to those two categories of health service employees. It is not available to civil servants, including those serving in my Department. The numbers employed in my Department have to be reduced further to 450 by the end of December 2012 and we will use the appropriate mechanisms such as re-organisation and re-allocation of work, including re-deployment where necessary, to meet this target. However, it should be noted that the numbers in the Department of Health and Children have reduced by 25% from 641 to 477 since 2005.

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