The HSE is to put in place restrictions on travel for staff and to minimise the use of the postal service in communicating with the public as part of a new plan to save money.
From the beginning of March, all staff travel, except for that involved in seeing patients or service users and which would qualify for travel and subsistence payments, is to be “replaced to the maximum”.
In the case of essential travel, staff are to be told to use public transport where possible.
The new directive came shortly after officials in the Department of Health told Ministers that it would be challenging for the HSE to meet targets for making savings on non-pay expenditure and the use of agency staff.
Officials said the HSE, which currently employs about 150,000 people, had not made sufficient savings in this area last year.
HSE chief executive Bernard Gloster told his senior leadership team in a memo, dated February 19th, that the organisation spends nearly €30 million each year on postal charges. He said it will move “progressively to a default position” of communication by text or email rather than by post.
Staff will be required to use the post only where no other contact details are available and, in the next letter, to state “visibly and clearly” that the HSE preferred to communicate by text or email.
However, he said “people in vulnerable circumstances due to age or social circumstance or dependency” may not be suitable for electronic communications and would continue to be contacted by post.
Mr Gloster’s memo noted the organisation had a travel and subsistence bill of about €92.6 million a year that needed to be cut.
He said all non-clinical travel was to be replaced as much as possible by online training, meetings and webinars. “It is accepted some in-person engagement is necessary, but this is required to be at the minimum,” he said.
In addition, he said no recruitment will be permitted of a person from a location from where they would probably need to regularly travel to another location to work. “All recruitment must be to the location most required to be present at and, where this is the case, travel and subsistence from previous locations cannot be approved or paid.”
The HSE subsequently told The Irish Times it was open to anyone to apply for and be recruited to a post anywhere in the country. “However, where a person is recruited to a HSE post based at a particular location, they cannot charge travel and subsistence for travel to work at that location.”
The HSE is also to clamp down on spending on training and conferences, particularly those using external facilities. Mr Gloster said the HSE currently spent at least €79.6 million annually on training and development, including conferences.
