'I have nothing to hide': New role for former chief of scandal-hit CHI cost State €123k in legal fees

Eilish Hardiman, who had been on medical leave in October 2023 when it became clear she would not be given a third term at the helm of CHI, took legal action in order to ensure her continued employment. File photo: Brian Lawless/PA

The State incurred a legal cost of €123,000 in creating a new role for the former CEO of Children’s Health Ireland at her same salary after the minister for health declined to renew her contract.

Eilish Hardiman, who had been on medical leave in October 2023 when it became clear she would not be given a third term at the helm of CHI, subsequently took legal action in order to ensure her continued employment.

Addressing the issue at the Public Accounts Committee on Thursday morning, Ms Hardiman acknowledged that the terms of the settlement which saw her appointed as strategic programme director at CHI last year on an equivalent salary to the CEO of €184,000 are subject to a non-disclosure agreement. However, she insisted: “I have nothing to hide."

She said she could not waive the terms of that NDA in order to address the matter further at the PAC as two other people were also involved in the agreement and would also have to waive their right to confidentiality.

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Then minister for health, Stephen Donnelly, ruled that Ms Hardiman’s contract should not be renewed in late 2023 amid the fallout from several scandals at CHI, including the insertion of non-medical grade springs into the spines of children during surgery and the alleged carrying out of unnecessary hip dysplasia surgeries on other children.

Ms Hardiman said that she had retained legal counsel when it became clear her contract would not be renewed due to “an employment law matter”, that being that she was entitled to a contract of indefinite duration as she had worked two separate five-year contracts as the head of CHI.

The committee heard that the legal cost of the mediation talks between Ms Hardiman and CHI which led to her re-appointment in the alternate role amounted to €123,000 after tax, and that bill had been footed by the Chief State Solicitor’s Office.

2021 report

CHI’s new chief executive Lucy Nugent said that “in hindsight” the organisation should have informed both the Comptroller and Auditor General and the NTPF about a 2021 report into issues surrounding waiting list management, including the fact that a consultant had allegedly referred public patients to his own private weekend clinics.

She said, however, that the first she had heard about the report was when she received a media query regarding same in May of this year from the Sunday Times. Asked why she had not informed her successor about the report during the handover of the CEO function, Ms Hardiman said that “a lot of the issues in the report had been addressed”.

She said the report was confidential and “never intended to be shared”. “The issues were known to management and had been raised with the HSE. What’s most important is that it was raised through the proper channels,” Ms Hardiman said. 

She conceded that she had never raised the matter with the Medical Council, something Ms Nugent has done recently on two occasions.

When asked why the matter had not been raised with the gardaí, as it had been by the HSE, Ms Nugent said she did not believe that the threshold for escalating matters in that fashion had been reached, adding that she did not believe the funds of the NTPF had been misused with regard to what had transpired.