Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senator Kyne for raising that question. As a former financier, the basic thing anybody wants to know about his or her pension is what his or her entitlement is and how to make provisions into the future. That is the essence of pensions. I have a script that I will read. It has been forwarded by the HSE in the west, from Saolta, but I do not accept the answer. It is not good enough, but I will give it to the Senator because people have come to him as they have to me. The answer is not acceptable. Using the pandemic and the cyberattack as a reason for not being able to tell a person his or her basic entitlements is not acceptable in this day and age. We all know that what you put it in, you get out, and it is accrued on an annual basis. Whether you have done 15 years or 30 years, you should know what your accruals are. I will read this script because the Senator will get a flavour of why I feel strongly about this.

I want to take the opportunity to thank the Senator for raising the issue. As I am sure he is aware, the HSE administers a pension service for its employees as well as for other health employers, such as certain hospitals. The HSE pensions administration function, like other support and administration functions, faced significant challenges over the past two years during Covid-19. Due to the pandemic, the HSE had to move its pension function to remote working at short notice. This involved significant challenges which included providing remote access to a variety of computer systems.

As the Senator is no doubt aware, pension processing is a complex operation that involves calculation of pension benefits which includes estimates, retirement benefits, temporary rehabilitation remuneration and injury grants to name but a few. In addition to the technical challenges at the outset of the pandemic, a significant number of pension staff was redeployed to support the emergency efforts, Covid-19 recruitment and contact tracing.This necessary temporary redeployment also has an impact on the delivery of pension services.

This situation was then compounded in May 2021 by the devastating impact of the cyberattack on the HSE. While it may now be a distant memory, the pension service is still dealing with the impact of the attack. The fact that access to all computerised systems ceased overnight had a massive impact on the HSE pension administration function. While access to most systems has now been restored, there are significant backlogs which the pension services must now work through.

The HSE recognises the challenges in the administration of the pensions and, as such, has implement a service improvement programme across the country. In order to address any current delays, the HSE suggests that any individuals who are experiencing difficulties in relation to their retirement benefit should make direct contact with their local pension office. The HSE remains committed to providing an inefficient and effective pension administration service to its employees.

The Senator will understand why, at the start of my response, I stood away from the answer provided. The lady in question has been trying to access this service for 12 months. At the end of the day, she has done X number of years service, and regardless of whether we had a cyberattack in 2021, at a certain point in time she will have known what her accruals were by that date and time.