Hundreds of retired HSE staff employed again despite moratorium

Hundreds of retired HSE employees are being re-employed in the health service despite repeated strictures that this should not occur, an audit report reveals.

In one area, HSE South, 138 retired employees were paid a salary in 2013, according to the report. Total payments were €2.36 million, an average of €17,000 per person.

Almost half were nurses, but the highest payments went to medical staff, who received an average of over €37,000 each.

A review of the payroll revealed one employee, who had retired on health grounds, was overpaid by €33,000 after his pension was not suspended when he returned to work.

Grace period

Twenty-two of the retired employees had a retirement date after February 2013, the final retirement date for those who availed of favourable pension terms under a “grace period”.

The work patterns of those re-employed varied greatly, from staff working a set number of hours weekly to those rehired full-time.

HSE human resource managers have issued repeated circulars since 2010 calling for the practice of hiring retired staff to cease.

An analysis of a sample of 15 re-employed retirees found a contract of employment was available in only one-third of cases.

Overpayments

The report says the absence of such contracts increases the risk that pension abatement rules will not be correctly applied. A failure to abate pensions could result in overpayments, it says.

One of the five employees with a valid employment contract was retained on retirement on the 14th point of the salary scale, in contravention of the direction that the minimum point of the scale was applicable.

The report says no structured plan was put in place to manage the exit of these re-employed retirees, in contravention of instructions from the HSE’s human resources division.

A general moratorium on recruitment has been in place in the HSE since 2009. Some 86 of the 138 retirees retired since then.

The report says while the safe delivery of health services must take priority when considering the retention or re-employment of retired staff, there was a lack of stringent controls where this happened.