Overpayments to health service staff have multiplied since the partial introduction of a controversial new payroll system which has cost millions and which Minister for Health Mary Harney admitted yesterday may now have to be scrapped, write Eithne Donnellan and Liam Reid.
The Irish Times has learned that overpayments to staff now total several million euro and informed sources confirmed last night that efforts to recoup the money from staff have been unsuccessful in some instances.
It also emerged that the Department of Finance raised serious concerns about the cost and management of the computerised payroll system, PPARs, last June.
Following a meeting with officials from the Department of Health and Health Service Executive, computer experts from the Department of Finance wrote in a memo that they had "serious concerns at the nature and cost of the support services" being provided by the consultants on the project, Deloitte, which has been paid €13.5 million in 2005 alone.
"We could not determine from the meeting what the nature of the value added being provided by Deloitte was," the memo said, suggesting the pay rates for the consultants might be too high.
There was also "no evidence" presented to them that the system, which has already cost €116 million, would reduce costs or provide increased efficiency. Deloitte refused to comment yesterday.
The Department of Finance's computer experts also indicated in the memo they had "serious concerns" about another multimillion euro computer system being introduced in the HSE, called FISP, which is meant to control and manage costs and spending.
The memo was released under the Freedom of Information Act to Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny, who last night said "€150 million blown on PPARs could have delivered a brand new 600-bed hospital".
The cost of the system was originally estimated at less than €9 million. Taoiseach Bertie Ahern admitted it still only covers 40,000 out of 140,000 staff. However, he said it would not be abandoned.
HSE chief executive Prof Brendan Drumm will ask the HSE board tomorrow to suspend the roll-out of the system until a review of its value is undertaken.
The system went fully live at Dublin's St James's Hospital and in the former North Western, Midlands and Mid Western Health Board regions between December 2003 and November 2004. It had been partially rolled out before then.
This summer it emerged that one employee in the northwest had been paid €1 million in error by the system. The HSE could not provide figures yesterday on the total amounts overpaid to staff.