HSE wants recovery of any excess payments made to former CRC chief executive

The HSE has signalled that it wants to see the repayment of any excess money paid to Paul Kiely, the former chief executive of the Central Remedial Clinic, based on an incorrectly calculated pay rate.

Deputy director general of the health authority Laverne McGuinness also told the Dáil Public Accounts Committee that about six senior management staff at the CRC were still being paid in excess of officially approved rates, pending a further review of management structures.

The committee yesterday examined a report drawn up by the interim administrator appointed by the HSE to run the CRC following the resignation of its former board last December.

The report, by John Cregan, said Mr Kiely and other senior staff had been shielded from the full effects of public service pay cuts and that his salary had been overstated as a result.

Ms McGuinness told the committee: “The former CEO, as the person charged with the executive responsibility for the administration of the CRC, would have been familiar with public pay policy and monies paid to him in excess of the properly calculated reduced rate for the period January 2010 to the date of his termination in June 2013 should be recovered.”

New chairman of the CRC Kieran Timmins said the board intended to write to Mr Kiely about the findings of the Cregan report but would first examine the details involved.

“Issues such as the implementation of Fempi [financial emergency legislation] – Croke Park agreement and/or Haddington Road agreement – on the full salary, calculation of severance payments, retirement age and other matters all need to be looked at prior...”

The new CRC chief executive, Stephanie Manahan, was receiving a salary of €86,761, he said.