Phil Prendergast (Labour)

I am disappointed by the moratorium on recruitment in the Health Service Executive which was announced last week. It was decided without any consultation with the HSE or any of the unions and represents a fundamental breach of faith in terms of industrial relations and governance. A directive from the Department of Finance to the Department of Health and Children stated that, for the next 18 months, the Minister for Finance, Deputy Brian Lenihan, will decide who is to be recruited to our health service and who is to be made redundant. That is extraordinarily arrogant. How can the Minister can make such decisions given he has difficulty running his own Department?

The decision to target fixed-term workers is overt discrimination against a category of employee. The Minister should have read the Protection of Employees (Fixed-Term Work) Act. His decision to implement this embargo without consultation is a blatant affront to social partnership and he should have read the industrial relations Acts. He thinks he might save money through these measures but he is wasting money because an understaffed service is an underperforming service.

One quarter of all departments and wards in Beaumont Hospital will have to close by the end of this year because of the embargo on recruitment. A total of 10% of its staff, 400 people, will lose their jobs and 90% of these are nurses, who are front-line staff. Yesterday morning, 140 people had their discharge from Beaumont Hospital delayed and last Friday, in the entire acute sector in all hospitals throughout the country, there were 880 delayed discharges. This means people fit for discharge could not be discharged and that places a huge additional burden in cost terms on the health services. In Drogheda there are 550 nurses, 180 of whom are on fixed-term contracts. These contracts will not be renewed. That means approximately one third of the staff at that hospital will be cast aside. The Department of Finance has stated that the loss of each 1,000 jobs costs the State €25 million through increased social welfare payments. That means €500 million in social welfare payments will have to be made up.

It is bitterly ironic that this directive was issued days before the Mental Health Commission reported that patients in south Tipperary did not receive the required treatment because of understaffing and underfunding. It is all the more ironic that sanction, which has been given to increase staff numbers in St. Luke's and St. Michael's, was not carried through. On that subject I wish to make a declaration of interest. I know many people who work at these facilities, one of whom is my husband. I called on the Minister for Health and Children to issue an apology to the patients and staff working in the hospital because they are encased in a Victorian asylum.

As far back as 2004, the authorities knew that serious issues surrounded these facilities.