MINISTER FOR Health Dr James Reilly has accepted the resignation of the Health Service Executive board and has vowed to bring greater ministerial accountability and responsibility to the running of the health service.
The 12-member board said it offered to resign at Dr Reilly’s request, and said it was supportive of the Minister’s ambition to reform the Irish health system.
The decision was announced after a HSE board meeting on Adelaide Road in Dublin yesterday afternoon. Dr Reilly said the move was part of a wider “change agenda” which he hoped would lead to greater integration and less duplication in the health service.
“It will be very clear that the Minister for Health will have direct access to top management of the HSE and [the] department in a unified fashion, will be far more responsible for healthcare and responsible to the Oireachtas and the people through that mechanism,” he said.
“The in-hospital experience of people when they can access ser-vices is excellent. But the issue has been getting access to those services. We intend to change that experience for our citizens.”
The Minister said he hoped to have legislation in place later this year to abolish the HSE board.
Once the legal requirements for the existence of the board are removed and it is abolished, a new corporate governance structure will be put in place which will make the health services more directly accountable to Dr Reilly.
An interim board made up of top-level Department of Health and HSE officials is to be appointed in the coming weeks. The next board meeting is scheduled for June 9th.
Businessman Dr Frank Dolphin has been asked to remain as chairman of the board during the interim period.
Dr Reilly said he promised to be accountable for goings on in the health service, and felt in the past boards had been put in place “to put a distance between ministers and their responsibilities”.
“I’m shortening that chain of the command with this new change today and I believe that will be for the betterment of patients through improved services,” he said. “I believe this Government was elected by the people with a strong mandate to have more accountability, more ministerial responsibility, and not for Ministers to disappear and hide behind other organisations and say this is not an issue for me but this is an issue for x, y or z.”
Dr Reilly said he hoped a greater level of integration would help to reduce waiting times in emergency departments and would speed up treatment times for inpatients and outpatients.
“Of course no Minister can micromanage the service or a hospital, but there are problems within our health service which have been outlined that don’t apply to one hospital, but to several. Those sort of issues will be very quickly brought to light in the future and dealt with,” he said.
The board members said their resignation was “an important initial step on the road towards implementing changes in how healthcare is delivered”.
“This initiative will ensure that the work of the HSE is closely aligned with the Department of Health and will facilitate greater cohesion across the entire healthcare system,” they said.
Dr Reilly said the resignations did not reflect on the board members personally or professionally, and paid tribute to the fact they had “given extraordinary service in the public interest, very often thanklessly”. Board members would not receive severance payments, he added.
Questioned on whether the board should have been left in place until legislation to bring about its abolition was ready, Dr Reilly said: “Why wait for legislation to achieve the superstructure we need when we can do it without it?” The move was not just for optics, he said.
* The annual fees payable to HSE board members have been set at €14,963 for board members since January 2010. A fee of €29,888 is paid to the chairman or chairwoman.
According to the HSE, board members can claim expenses on a vouched basis for costs incurred while performing their roles. These include attending board and committee meetings and other HSE-related events.
THE BOARD IN PROFILE: MEMBERS OF THE HSE:
CATHAL MAGEE
Mr Magee took up his position as chief executive of the HSE in September 2010 succeeding Prof Brendan Drumm. The former acting chief executive of Eircom was hired to help bring a new impetus to the organisation based on his business background skills.
PAT FARRELL
Mr Farrell is chief executive of the Irish Banking Federation, the main representative body for
banking and financial services in Ireland. Prior to this he held a number of senior executive
appointments in the public and private sectors.
EUGENE McCAGUE
Mr McCague is a solicitor and chairman of Arthur Cox. He is a former chairman of the governing body of the Dublin Institute of Technology and a former president of the Dublin Chamber of Commerce. He is said to have tendered his resignation a week ago.
JOE MOONEY
Mr Mooney is a retired senior official from the Department of Finance, where he had extensive policy involvement in the area of health and social welfare. Prior to this, he worked on economic and taxation matters. In addition, he is a former member of the Pensions Board.
PROF ANNE SCOTT
Prof Scott is professor of nursing and deputy president of Dublin City University. Previously, she held academic posts at the University of Stirling, Glasgow Caledonian University and the University of Glasgow.
DR DERMOT POWER
Dr Power is a consultant in geriatric medicine at the Mater hospital and is medical director at St Mary's Hospital in the Phoenix Park. A graduate in medicine from University College Dublin, he
attained his fellowship of the Royal College of Physicians
of Ireland in 2006.
SYLDA LANGFORD
Ms Langford is the former director general of the Office of theMinister for Children and Youth Affairs at the Department of Health. Prior to this, she was an assistant secretary general at the
Department of Justice. Her professional background is in social policy and social work.
JOE LAVELLE
A manager with Deloitte, Mr Lavelle was appointed to the board by former minister for health Mary Harney in February of last year. Mr Lavelle has more than 10 years of advisory experience across audit, risk assessment, company law and corporate governance.
JOHN FITZGERALD
Former Dublin city manager has been involved in local government for most of his career. He is chairman of An Post, the Grangegorman Development Agency and of the two regeneration
agencies set up in Limerick following his report on the city's social exclusion issues.
PROF NIAMH BRENNAN
She is a chartered accountant and Michael MacCormac professor of management at UCD. She
chaired the commission on financial management and control systems in the health service and also chairs the Dublin Docklands Development Authority.
NUALA HUNT
A chartered accountant and tax consultant, Ms Hunt has 20 years of business experience in
financial planning, management and governance across the public and private sectors. Past roles
include audit manager with Arthur Andersen, and company secretary and financial controller
with Paddy Power.
