Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 8 May 2018
354. Deputy Sean Sherlock asked the Minister for Health if he is satisfied there is proper democratic accountability in respect of governance and budgetary oversight of all hospitals within the South-South West hospital group. [20072/18]
Amharc ar fhreagraThe HSE’s Performance and Accountability Framework (PAF) makes explicit the responsibilities of health service managers in relation to the four domains of performance, which are: Access to and Integration of services, the Quality and Safety of those services, specific Financial, Governance and Compliance requirements and effectively harnessing the efforts of the Workforce. The emphasis of the Framework is on recognising good performance, improving performance at all levels of the health service and ensuring that individual managers are held to account for their performance.
The Framework ensures that named senior health service managers designated as Accountable Officers, including all Hospital Group CEOs, are explicitly and personally accountable for performing within their budget allocation. The sole line of executive accountability for the Hospital Group CEO is to the National Director for Acute Hospital Services.
Accountable Officers are provided with a budget to deliver the services set out in the National Service Plan and in their service level operational plans. They are accountable for their performance in delivering against these plans within budget, and for any specified performance improvements. Accountable Officers are responsible for preparing a financial plan in line with their Performance Agreement which sets out the actions that they will take to meet the agreed performance targets across the four domains of performance outlined above.
It is a core responsibility of managers to manage the delivery of services for which they are accountable and they are required to keep performance under constant review, have in place a monthly performance management process and take timely corrective actions to address any underperformance emerging. Under the PAF, Hospital Group CEOs are expected to have formal monthly performance management processes in place with their direct reports who are accountable at hospital level, to satisfy accountability requirements under the PAF. This includes the Voluntary Hospitals within their Group (this responsibility exercised via the Service Level Arrangement (SLA) signed by the Group CEO with each Voluntary Hospital).
In relation to the governance and budgetary oversight of hospitals within the South/South West Hospital Group specifically, I have asked the Health Service Executive to respond to the Deputy directly as soon as possible.
