THE MINISTER for Health Mary Harney has said patient services will suffer as a result of the substantially reduced budget available for the health service next year, unless reforms and changes envisaged under the Croke Park agreement are delivered on the ground.
The cut in health service funding for 2011 could be higher than the figure of €600 million previously forecast, she confirmed. Speaking prior to her address to the Irish Hospital Consultants Association conference in Adare on Saturday, she said no decisions had been taken on this as of yet. She said she did not accept suggestions made at the conference that the scale of cutbacks envisaged for next year would cripple the health service. But she acknowledged the situation would be challenging and would not be easy.
She added: "For 2011, in the context of the budget that will be available, if we cannot get the kind of changes envisaged by the Croke Park agreement then patient services suffer.
"And they need not suffer if that radical programme of change is implemented across the country in every single setting. In both the hospital and community setting there is great room for improvement in how we provide services."
The Health Service Executive (HSE) was one of the State agencies that missed the deadline of last week set by the Implementation Body for the Croke Park agreement for the submission of action plans. However, Ms Harney said the HSE had radical plans and she had met its chief executive Cathal Magee and head of human resources Seán McGrath to discuss these last Thursday. She suggested that the scheduling of this meeting may have been the reason the HSE missed the deadline for submitting its plan.
The Minister suggested that plan would involve redeployment of personnel to where service needs were greater as well as the use of the provision in the agreement to roster staff on five out of any seven days in a bid to reduce overtime and other costs.
"We are clear what we want as far as change is concerned. There is a whole host of change. One title on it is flexibility. If there is a ward that is not so busy in a hospital and another ward that is very busy, that staff can move to the busy ward from the less busy ward. That is putting it in very simple fashion as far as nurses and other staff are concerned.
"Clearly it will require more five-day working. We want to see a reduction in overtime and on call. These are costing the health service over one billion per year and it is not core pay."
The Minister suggested greater flexibility would be needed to move staff from areas where services were no longer being provided to areas where services needed to be improved such as transferring staff in the midwest from Ennis into Limerick or Nenagh into Limerick or vice versa.
"That is the kind of agenda we need to see in order to be able to maintain services," she said.
Ms Harney said that as it was clear that there would be substantial reductions in health funding for next year, it was essential to secure changes in work practices and to get rid of archaic practices.
Asked about comments made by the Minister of State Conor Lenihan that if progress was not made soon it would probably signal the end of the Croke Park deal, Ms Harney said she was optimistic that in the health sector the deal had the capacity to deliver.