Taskforce meeting to examine how the multi-billion health budget is being spent

Bernard Gloster will co-chair a group set up to tackle budget overruns and spending in the health service. Picture: Gareth Chaney/Collins

A new group set up to tackle budget overruns and spending in the health service is to meet for the first time on Wednesday.

The Productivity and Savings Taskforce, which will be co-chaired by HSE chief executive Bernard Gloster and Department of Health secretary-general Robert Watt, has been asked to examine how the multi-billion health budget is being spent.

Speaking ahead of the first meeting, Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said a “divergence” between resourcing and activity has emerged.

"Expenditure on acute care activity has increased by more than 80% over the last seven years, from €4.4bn in 2016 to €8.1bn in 2023, with acute care expenditure now making up over a third of our overall spending. The health services’ pay bill has risen by €3.2bn in the same period.

“The number of patients treated has not kept up with this large increase in resourcing, however, rising by just 10%-20% over the same period.” 

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Mr Donnelly also said that since 2016 the budget for health has increased from €11.8bn to the €22.5bn announced in the budget for 2024.

“In that time, we also saw record levels of recruitment with the number of whole-time equivalents (WTEs) employed rising by almost 40% from 91,559 to 145,052.

“While we have succeeded in increasing activity in our hospitals, this has come at an increasingly high cost."

The taskforce will aim to realise savings and maximise productivity across the health services.

Foremost amongst the areas of interest will be:

• The use of new technology to provide hospitals with access to leading-edge data management and visualisation tools to improve health outputs.
• New ways of working — streamlining operational processes to drive productivity across the health sector.
• Procurement 
• The future cost of health care, which will consider amongst other things, the impact of demographics and emerging technologies on the health care services of the future.