€2.35m SIPTU ‘slush fund’ another legacy of Celtic Tiger excess

WHEN quizzed for her thoughts on the controversial SIPTU training fund yesterday, Health Minister Mary Harney laid out what exactly €2.35 million could do in the health service.

She spoke robustly on the contribution such a fund could make to home care packages and nursing homes.

Let’s be honest, though.€2.35m will hardly cure the ills of our ailing health service.

Yet it is a sum of money which could have huge ramifications for both the HSE and the country’s largest trade union SIPTU.

For much of the past week, pressure was mounting on both while stronger political pressure was being put on the HSE and the department. That was to be expected.

It was state money that paid for the 31 “study” trips to Australia, America, Hong Kong and Europe for trade unionists and Government officials.

The authorities continued to pump money into the “slush fund” — as the opposition described it — year after year, in spite of the accounting shambles. Each year, the next tranche was paid without proper scrutiny of how the previous year’s monies were spent.

It appeared this fund was typical of the Celtic Tiger excess which permeated almost every aspect of society.

No one appeared to be asking the pertinent questions: What “study” or “training” required the participants to fly to Savannah? Exactly who went and what was their role in the trip? Was the money justified by the knowledge gained? Could such knowledge have been acquired for a fraction of the cost much closer to home?

It was only while suffering from the cold-light-of-day hangover that anyone took the trouble to check any of this.

If there had not been the HSE audit, the state would most likely have continued to keep the Bank of Ireland bank account topped up.

The lodging of a formal garda complaint has changed the complexion of this debacle from an accusation of clumsy accounting to a potentially criminal matter and SIPTU finds itself in the thick of the controversy.

It is unchartered territory for the union.

Throughout the many financial irregularities that have hit the headlines, SIPTU has consistently adopted the higher ground, voicing criticism and calling for heads to roll.

Now the shoe is on the other foot. Even in this latest controversy the union has been highly critical of the failures of the authorities to properly monitor how the money was being spent. It has gone on the offensive, even threatening legal action if it does not receive the information it requires from the HSE for its own investigation.

However, the administration of an account with its name on the title is now a matter of a garda investigation.

SIPTU has produced documentation proving the €2.35m did not form part of its own accounts but its ignorance may now be rigorously questioned given that it has admitted its official was a signatory to the Bank of Ireland account.

That particular official is on sick leave making it even harder to assimilate the information it requires.

Amid all of this though, the pressure has not been taken off the HSE nor, for that matter, the Department of Health. The decision of HSE chief executive Brendan Drumm to call for an independent investigation of his own organisation’s handling of the entire €60m SKILL fund shows that he knows there has been serious shortcomings.

For its part the Department of Health has now been forced to start examining which of its officials availed of the trips abroad. A similar investigation is likely to begin in other departments that participated in the scheme. Over the coming days and weeks many questions will be asked. The answers will prove very interesting.