National Service Plan 2024 published

The HSE has published the 2024 National Service Plan following approval by the Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly and the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration, and Youth Roderic O’Gorman. The Government has allocated a budget of €23.5 billion for health and social care services, which is 4.6 per cent above last year’s budget. Of this €23.5 billion, €2.8 billion has been provided by the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration, and Youth in respect of specialist disability services, with a balance of €20.7 billion provided by the Department of Health, which will allow for 683 new whole time equivalent (WTE) staff for disability services and 2,268 WTEs for other health and social care services.

The plan includes:

• €162.8 million investment in new service developments, including enhancing mental health and disability services;
• €918.7 million once-off funding;
• €834.7 million to fund increased costs of providing the existing level of service
• Funding to support the implementation of the six new health regions.

The HSE’s focus for 2024 is to improve access to urgent and emergency care; prioritise waiting lists; continue to enhance mental health and disability services; and build on existing partnerships to develop and improve services.

Mr Ciarán Devane, HSE Chairman, said: “The National Service Plan for 2024 is a continuation of the work of the preceding year and represents another year of growth. Together, the two years will see staff increase in the region of over 9,000 WTE and funding by €3 billion. During 2024, we will consolidate the developments of recent years, particularly around access, and ensure we deliver the increased capacity this investment is intended to provide. We want to allow the increased number of clinical staff to care for an increasing number of patients and users of our services.”

The Irish Hospital Consultants Association (IHCA) has criticised the lack of commitment in the plan to open a specified number of additional general acute hospital beds this year. The Association has pointed out that the Minister for Health previously announced plans to open 147 additional acute beds in 2024; however, this is not reflected in the plan. The figure is also significantly below what is required to start addressing the severe overcrowding in public hospitals and tackle the persistently high waiting times for treatment, according to an IHCA statement.

“It is deeply disappointing that the service plan for 2024 has failed to commit to opening a specified number of additional general public hospital beds this year. Even if all of the 147 additional beds promised by the Minister for 2024 are opened on time, this would mean a net increase of just 45 hospital beds over and above where we should have been at more than a year ago…. It is also regrettable that the HSE and Government continues to renege on its pledge to commit the €1 billion in funding required to open 1,500 additional rapid build hospital beds across 15 acute public hospital sites this year.

“Despite a slight overall increase in spending, just €3.1 million is allocated for new measures in mental health. This is the second year in a row when the level of funding for new measures has actually decreased compared with the previous year, from €24 million in 2022 to €14 million in 2023, and to just €3.1 million in 2024 – a reduction of almost €21 million, or 87 per cent, in two years.”