The £500,000 hush-up
Friday 21st August 2009, 2:30PM BST.
Health minister Hunter Adam.
Health and Social Services is trying to hush up the waste of an estimated £500,000 of taxpayers’ money as a result of a bungled staffing issue.
Today is the second anniversary of a senior health professional being paid not to work as the department failed to resolve the situation at islanders’ expense.
Although exonerated of any work-related matters in January, the consultant has still not been allowed to resume duties by the department, which refuses to discuss its actions.
The impact on the taxpayer has been huge.
Since the professional, who is local, was suspended on 21 August 2007 for what has been described to the Guernsey Press as a personality clash with a superior, a locum has reportedly been employed to provide cover.
That would have cost an estimated £500,000 for two years. Including paying the salary of the suspended individual, the total bill could be anywhere from £690,000 to £740,000 on NHS rates.
Attempts to get accurate figures from the department were unsuccessful.
An official said: ‘For confidentiality and data protection reasons, it is not possible for the HSSD to disclose details of any suspension.’
Requests for information about why the suspension lasted so long and the financial implications of that were also brushed aside.
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Minister H Adam has been one of those most vocal in asserting that not only are savings in his department impossible but also that greater expenditure is essential. Some might say it’s no surprise that he takes that line when his department can promote profligacy on this scale. How many more examples of waste could be found in the HSSD skeleton cupboard if we were allowed to poke around?
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An absolute disgrace. We MUST be told whether the decision-makers on this debacle are the politicians or the senior civil servants “running” HSSD. My money would be on the latter.
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Why doesn’t the Editor of this esteemed organ ask the individual concerned if he or she agrees to be named and the facts disclosed.
This would sink the attempt by the HSSD to hide behind data protection and individual anonymity.
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When will people stop hiding behind “data protection” as an excuse for covering up bad management and bad decisions…own up, tell all and let your employer (us tax payers) decide if you are fit for purpose.
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Well
It’s obvious they are not fit for the purpose they have been set to do.
Then try to cover it up makes it a criminal affair; had it been anyone other than governing body they would be for the high jump.
Come on people: get this in the open and deal with it; otherwise you will be as guilty.
Dismissal must be the first step,
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I honestly don’t understand the outrage.
Personnel problems happen everywhere. You can’t force people to work when they believe their personal conditions are intolerable. What difference would it have made if they had released a statement advising that a senior post had left and that some sort of process was beginning that involved full pay and other stuff? Would the outrage be “we must stop giving those wasters at HSSD money!”
So we whip up another storm of hatred against services that need taxpayer money.
I would agree more if this was discoverred to be one of many personnel issues, that would constitute gross neglect. One person (who happened to be highly paid) falling out with another, or with a system is not an indication of ‘waste’.
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Someone show me where I can apply for a job at HSSD! I’d love to be paid 2 years salary for not working just because I’ve got a personality clash with my boss. I could find plenty of productive things to do with my time!
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I’m very concerned about the environmental impact of using that amount of black ink on today’s front page.
In comparison to using the Ecofont available from http://www.ecofont.eu/ecofont_en.html printing a black background to give white text is completely irresponsible!!!!!
Shame on you Guernsey Press.
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Arnald
You are totally missing the point. This has absolutely nothing to do with working conditions or personnel problems. Of course those happen all the time. But they don’t usually result in the employee being kept on the payroll on full pay for years afterwards at the taxpayer’s expense. That is the issue and it is indefensible regardless of one’s social or political views.
Sweeping things under the carpet in the hope that they will go away rather than dealing with them, and then claiming that HSSD has no scope for making financial cuts as there is no apparent over-staffing or wastage makes HSSD now look totally stupid. They simply cannot survive this.
But guess what will happen – Deputy Adam and one or two politicians will no doubt fall on their swords while the actual senior civil servants responsible will survive, in their usual unaccountable way, to make further similar errors at great cost to the taxpayer. Enough is enough !!!
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My life is a series of missed points, David.
I’m just not sure we can jump to some of these conclusions. There is no evidence to suppose lessons haven’t been learned or action taken. We cannot know the process currently involved and we are being led by an hysterical and emotive language. Ultimately this negativity is bad for the public perception of the entire service. It’s a sustained attack.
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Think of a number
Double it
Add a nought
Then make up the story to fit
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Paul Le P
Do me a favour and give me a tinkle if you do get a like job, suit me down to the ground.
It must be hallowed ground, because those there now; seem to walk on hallowed ground
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I will not tolerate corrupt guernsey polatishens. if i had my way thay would be flogged. And when we stop to resupply the beer fridge, God willing, thay would be flogged some more. And then enslaved for the rest of thear miserable lives.guernsey was great let’s make it great again.
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Arnald
You’re not a civil servant by any chance are you?
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Yeah… darn those polatishens…
I DO hope some details are disclosed, however will we send him his 2nd anniversary gifts of cotton, he so deserves? I made him a cotton doily :)
Eric.. Paul Le P? Any way we could go thirds on the position? I could really do with a new pair of shoes, these ones I bought from Peacocks are falling apart.
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Apart from “Politics”, “Waste of Money” and “Personality Clash”, no body seems to have looked into the situation of how patients’ care on the island has been adversely affected since the suspension. Generally speaking a locum could never replace the clinical experience and vital decision making of a permanent Consultant. We all know how long it takes to get a Consultant properly trained before taking up an appointment of that grade. Also, having been out of clinical practice for that long, I doubt the Genereal Medical Council would allow the Consultant to resume clinical responsibilities unsupervised and without undergoing further professional retraining, in this day and age of Clinical Governance and Revalidation. What a shame in the name of “Fair Play”, in view of the fact that the Consultant has been exonerated. I think the end result will most likely be more hush hush, with a “Golden Handshake” or “Early Retirement” to get rid of the individual. Can some one tell me the nature of the Specialty? Can we not push for an Open Enquiry judicially?
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Miss student Bob.
You’re lucky you’ve got shoes, all I’ve got is sacking for my feet and a miserable (now drying) fig leaf.
But apart from all that, this must not be allowed to dry up it must hack away at the guilty ones still they are brought to justice.
Notice the (Wooden) person has nothing to say about this
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