HSE spending on management consultants compared to 'runaway train'

HSE CEO Bernard Gloster has ordered his finance team to slash its spending on private management consultants by up to €40m. Picture: Sasko Lazarov / Photocall Ireland

HSE spending on management consultancy has more than doubled from €48m to nearly €100m in two years, with the payments described as a “runaway train”.

The surge in spending has resulted in calls for new procedures to be put in place such as the requirements for cost-benefit analyses, and the need for business cases to be presented beforehand, to check whether in-house staff can carry out the work.

Data provided to Sinn Féin health spokesperson David Cullinane revealed that spending on consultancy costs more than doubled between 2020 and 2022. These costs include legal advice, tax, and financial advisory, public relations and marketing, as well as HR, IT consultancy, strategic planning, and business improvement.

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In 2020, €48m was spent, this increased to almost €76m in 2021, with it rising to almost €100m last year.

A significant amount of money was spent on strategic planning and business improvement, which also included costs related to covid-19.

The figures come after HSE chief executive Bernard Gloster ordered his finance team to slash its spending on private management consultants by up to €40m.

The multi-million cost of the external advisors came into public focus after the Irish Examiner revealed that Cork University Hospital (CUH) had spent €608,000 on PwC consultants in the space of just three months.

“There needs to be a value-for-money exercise attached to any spend on management consultancy,” said Mr Cullinane.

“A clear business case must be made on why an outside consultancy is needed, and there needs to be cost-containment put in place.

These are exactly the areas that need to be reigned in.”

It has also emerged recently that almost 1,000 hospital consultant posts are not filled on a permanent basis, with some lying vacant for years.

Last month, 480 consultant posts were vacant, including 323 that are newly created and currently under recruitment, in figures released to Mr Cullinane.