Massive levels of waste in HSE spend

Taxpayers’ money is being spent on massive HSE staff overpayments, lucrative non-tendered contracts for ex-workers, credit cards given to non-HSE employees, and “blank cheque” payouts within the health service.

The situation, which also includes a missing financial paper trail at an elderly facility, is revealed in the latest HSE internal audit files, detailed for the first time today.

Documents obtained by the Irish Examiner show that, despite the system’s significant budget woes, serious questions continue to exist over how public money is used.

Included among 73 separate internal audit files are revelations a major hospital gave hundreds of thousands of euro in non-tendered contracts to ex-staff.

The situation at Letterkenny General Hospital, which breached competition and transparency rules, shows that between 2008 and December 2012, one firm owned by a hospital employee who has since resigned received a €275,357 non-tendered contract to remove facility waste.

A second firm supplying a laundry service received over €150,000 between 2010 and 2012. The internal audit was told a tender process took place and three quotations sought. However, the audit found just one, which “did not constitute an appropriate tender”.

The hospital said the contracts highlighted are now undergoing tendering and service level agreements. However, the audit team said despite raising similar concerns in the past, “remedial action still remains to be taken”.

A separate audit raised further concerns over overpayments to HSE staff.

The 2013 document, which focussed on the HSE Dublin Mid Leinster area, said as of September 2012, a total of €314,000 was owed by 348 current and former employees who were overpaid in error by €100 to €23,000.

Almost half (48%) of cases did not explain the errors, while the people involved cannot be forced to return the money.

At the Sacred Heart Hospital in Castlebar, Co Mayo, the audit team again raised questions over how money is spent, saying a vital financial paper trail throughout 2010 is missing from the older persons’ facility files.

After concerns were noted over an “incomplete audit trail” in 2011, the HSE team carried out a second “substantive” check.

It found: “Assurance cannot be given that all income due was identified, collected and recorded, and the incomplete audit trail makes it difficult to identify a loss or to quantify a loss. There is an increased risk of error or fraud.” A discrepancy of €14,000 exists between income receipts and HSE account lodgements during 2010, the audit noted.

However, it said as “most of the cash books, receipt books and lodgement books” for the period are “missing”, this is not a complete picture.

Further audits examine concerns over financial controls in key services.