The Comptroller and Auditor General's (C&AG) report on the cost overrun of the health service's computerised staff management system reveals mismanagement throughout the time of the project, the Labour Party said today.
Party health spokeswoman Liz McManus said there was a lack of supervision and leadership in the Department of Health and that administrators and ministers were attempting to duck responsibility over the Personnel, Payroll and Related Systems (PPARS) project.
She said it was "extraordinary" that health service executives were awarded bonuses during the years in which the PPARS fiasco was unfolding.
The previous minister for health, Micheál Martin, and current minister Mary Harney were both responsible for a "poorly planned and ill-thought" project, she said.
One of the main criticisms of the C&AG John Purcell's report was the reliance on consultants in the development of the system.
"The failure to take steps to ensure some limits on the amounts that the consultants could charge was one of the main reasons why taxpayers ended up with such a major bill," Ms McManus said.
Fine Gael's Dr Liam Twomey said the report is "a damning exposé of the failed management and governance of the PPARS project over a period of seven or more years.
"At a time when resources are badly needed to tackle waiting lists and crowded A&Es, the waste of money on this project is even more galling," he added.
He said the failure to call a halt to a project the C&AG now reckons at close to €200 million "constitutes one of the single greatest abdications of responsibility over the course of this Government," Mr Twomey said.
Sinn Fein Dail leader and health spokesman Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin said the money was wasted and could have been used to extend medical card system to over 200,000 more people as promised in the last general election.
"They duly broke that promise as they continued to allow public money to be poured down the drain, enriching private businesses while public patients suffered," Mr ó Caoláin said.
The projected cost was just over €9 million, and it was due to be operative by 2000. The Health Service Executive suspended work on the project in August pending an internal review, the results of which are due early next year.