Eight HSE officials clock up €109k in travel expenses

Eight senior HSE officials clocked up €109,380 in travel expenses in just over a year — including €31,043 for one person alone.

The pay-outs are detailed in the latest HSE internal audits, which also highlight how GPs are claiming for drug addict work at already-closed clinics; lucrative non-tendered contracts for existing staff; and concerns patient files could fall into the wrong hands.

The records, obtained by the Irish Examiner under the Freedom of Information Act, show between January 2012 and early 2013 a total of 3,555 people working in the HSE South-East area shared a total travel and subsistence payout of €8.279m. Of this, 481 managers received €945,131 — of which the top eight were given €109,380.