Expected shortfall of half a billion euro highlights scale of crisis facing next Minister for Health.

Tuesday 15^th March 2016.  The Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) has said that the expected shortfall of half a billion euro in funding for the health services was proof that the health budget had been under resourced for the current year and confirmed the IMO contention at the time that the budget figures were not credible. 

Dr. Ray Walley, President of the IMO said that the organisation had warned at the time of the budget that the projected spending figure would be insufficient to cope with demands.  He said  “we are looking at a massive shortfall simply because the budget did not provide adequate resources in the first place.  The whole budget process for health is farcical and makes this kind of budget crisis inevitable."

He said; “The proposal by the outgoing Government that they will not countenance a supplementary budget and may curtail spending towards the end of the year would cause a major problem in hospital services in particular and is simply not realistic.  Treating an overspend this year as a forward payment from next year’s budget is similarly impractical.”

Dr. Walley said that it was critical that any new Programme for Government would put forward practical, workable solutions to deal with the funding crisis and give certainty to health professionals that they will not be left without funds or resources at the end of the year.