THE HSE has denied owing Dublin City Council €3.5 million in arrears for the provision of the Dublin Fire Brigade ambulance service.
Dublin Fire Brigade provides the emergency ambulance services for the capital and attends more than 90,000 ambulance calls each year, which account for 73 per cent of the brigade’s emergency calls.
The fire brigade is funded by the Dublin local authorities, but the HSE reimburses the four authorities, through Dublin City Council for the provision of the ambulance service.
However, although the service is worth more than €10 million annually there is no formal service contract in place.
Assistant Dublin city manager Séamus Lyon said that since 2005 there had been a “gentleman’s agreement” with the HSE in relation to the payments for the service.
However, since 2007 the HSE had “reneged on elements” of that agreement and had paid the full amounts owed.
“€3.5 million is outstanding since 2007 from the HSE,” Mr Lyons said.
The HSE, however, denies that there are any monies owed to the council and in a statement said it was “not in default in its payments”.
“The National Ambulance Service has agreed with Dublin City Council remuneration for these services and to date all of these agreed accounts are paid up to date,” it said.
A recent report by England’s chief fire and rescue adviser Sir Ken Knight, commissioned by the Dublin city and county managers, recommended that a formal service level agreement be put in place as quickly as possible.
The report, details of which were published in The Irish Timesyesterday, recommends a major restructuring of Dublin Fire Brigade to cope with severe manpower and budgetary pressures.
However, Siptu and Impact representatives yesterday said they were concerned the report was being used as a “smokescreen” to justify cuts to the service.
“This is a hatchet report. I am not against change, but this report does not say how the changes will be funded.
“If it goes ahead, if operational staff are cut, the public will be the biggest losers,” Siptu representative John Kidd said.
Impact representative Ros MacCobb said there were aspects of the report which had merit but he was concerned the local authorities would “cherry pick” the elements of the report which suited their agenda for cuts.
“I would be personally concerned that this report would be a smokescreen to implementing cuts and I would question what sort of service will be left for the citizens of Dublin.”
