1.5k health posts being held empty

ONE thousand five hundred health service positions are being held empty this year across Northern Ireland’s Health Trusts because the Executive chose to cut the health budget by £113.5m in 2010/11, claimed the Minister Michael McGimpsey.

By The Newsroom

Published 24th Feb 2011, 11:55 BST

The Health Minister revealed the statistic when asked for an update on the 4000 jobs that could be lost as a result of the draft Budget 2011-15.

He replied: “Health Trusts are already operating stringent vacancy controls. This year alone, 1,500 posts are being held empty. They are being held empty because in 2010/11 the Executive chose to cut my budget by £113.5m and then another £16.6m as a result of swine flu.

“And there have already been redundancies. I have been running a voluntary severance programme for RPA and CSR.

“If nothing changes in the budget, those 1,500 posts will disappear completely. The 4,000 figure is a conservative estimate of a redundancies figure over and above that.

“The equation is simple - if you want to staff the health service properly you need to be prepared to pay for that.”

Health Minister Northern Ireland