Hospital Staff

92. Deputy Seán Kyne asked the Minister for Health the basis for the current recruitment restrictions affecting newly qualified midwives who have recently completed their training and are now registered to practice; the number of vacant midwifery posts in University Hospital Galway; and the measures being taken to fill these vacancies to recruit newly qualified midwives into the public health service. [72271/26]

I am inquiring about the number of vacant midwifery posts in University Hospital Galway. Recently recruited staff who have completed their qualifications are seeking positions and have been told there are no posts available. This is an important issue for the safety of patients in University Hospital Galway.

The HSE knows how many nurses and midwives are due to graduate each year. It is completely known, and it must plan its recruitment accordingly. Retaining these new qualified graduates is essential to the future of the health service and continues to be a priority. To be clear, there is no recruitment embargo in the HSE. Recruitment has not been stopped. There are strengthened recruitment controls, including in the west and north west, to ensure that appointments are affordable and directed to the areas where patient need is greatest. As part of that strategic approach, the HSE has to prioritise direct recruitment where vacancies are being filled with sustained agency use, and the scale of the opportunity is clear. In the west and north west, for example, agency expenditure was €87.2 million in the eight months to the end of August, which was 11.5% above budget. That really constrains what the west and north west can do in other ways. Recruiting graduates directly into those roles currently being filled by agency staff would help because it would help to retain the newly qualified professionals in the public service. It builds a more stable, permanent workforce. It supports safe care and delivers better value on the overall pay budget. HSE West and North West has advised me that there are currently seven permanent staff midwife vacancies in maternity services at UHG. There are 19 newly qualified midwifery graduates from the University of Galway. All 19 have been interviewed and placed on a recruitment panel from which appointments can be made as vacancies arise. Seven have been offered posts in the region. Six have accepted to date. I expect that work will continue, with graduates matched to available posts across the region based on clinical needs and workforce priorities. I was concerned to hear of reports that some newly qualified nurses in Galway were offered positions which were subsequently not approved. That is not okay. A more strategic and compassionate approach than that must be taken. We need to treat our graduates better than that. As I said, the HSE knows that nurses and midwives are graduating. It must make offers based on the right locations with the necessary approvals in place. I have been advised by the HSE that of 307 graduate nurses and midwives in the west and north west, 224 have been offered posts and 186 have accepted. That means 73% of graduates in the region have received employment offers.

I thank the Minister for the response. The midwives who have graduated are advised that there are 23 vacancies in the region. The Minister says there are seven. There may be different classifications for full midwifery posts or others. That is what I have been informed. I welcome that of 19 newly qualified graduates, seven have been offered posts and six have accepted, but a large number of graduates still have no positions in the area in which they have studied and trained. Many of these have been advised within the system to seek agency work as healthcare assistants. This is important work but not what they are qualified for. They are qualified as midwives and the expectation would be that they would get positions in the area. I am not sure if this is a particular challenge in the west and north west, and I appreciate there are budgetary issues, but there needs to be better planning for the training of midwives and the subsequent offering of positions.

I have been inundated with calls from students, midwives and nurses from Galway who were promised contracts but have not been offered them. Some of them are in the audiovisual room today, where they spoke about how disrespected they feel after years of working really hard and the sacrifices that they have made to qualify. These are highly qualified young professionals. Many of them have been left unemployed and without a permanent contract in the health service. The Minister mentioned midwives. We have been given a figure of 23 vacant posts. Of a class of 80 nurses, only nine have received contracts. Some of those are only temporary contracts of just several weeks, with some ending in November and December. When I raised this with officials in the Department, they assured me that this would be resolved within days. Weeks later, we still do not have a resolution to this and we still have multiple student midwives and nurses without positions. Can the Minister give a commitment today that this issue will be resolved?

It is important to say that staffing in the region has increased by 478 to date this year. Of that, nursing and midwifery has been the largest contributor to that growth. There are 226 new nurses and midwives to date this year. Galway has recorded significant growth, with an additional 132 people hired, of whom 93 are nurses and midwives. What the Deputy is saying is completely correct. Every single year, nurses and midwives graduate and they do it at the same time. It is completely foreseeable, recurring, predictable and should absolutely be managed in the same way. We know we have invested significantly in a brilliant, expert workforce that wants to work in our State in our healthcare system. I have had this conversation with the HSE as far back as September of last year and it is essential that graduates are offered a position in advance so they know they have a job and know where it will be. That said, that job needs to be where the health service needs it and it will not necessarily be directly in Galway. It could be in the region where the health service needs it to make sure all of our hospitals are supported. I completely agree and this is the way it should be done.

I thank the Minister for the response. I will give a sense of the words of some of the nurses themselves. They say the whole situation is so disheartening. They said that after being offered a full-time, permanent contract last week on St. Joseph's Ward, they were meant to have orientation on Monday, 5 October, and start the post on Monday, 12 October. On Tuesday, they got an email from HR to say the posts were being taken back. Another nurse said: We were given assurances as far back as this time last year that permanent positions would be available to newly qualified nurses. We have worked hard throughout our degrees, gained experience within the hospital and committed ourselves to providing care to patients in Galway. Yet now, after qualifying, many of us cannot secure a permanent nursing position in our own hospital. This is despite the nurses being told they would be offered these positions. Clearly, there is an issue. I am not sure if it is related solely to the genuine overspend issues in the west and north west. I appreciate that is an important issue. However, these individuals worked hard and graduated and did so on the understanding they would be offered positions.

Is that not the most reasonable and professional expectation they should have? Deputy Kyne is completely right. They should know they have a position within the region and what that will be. As I said, it might not be directly in Galway but it will be within the region where they are needed. On 1 January of every year, each region knows it has a certain number of people it can recruit. It also knows it has a certain number of nurses, midwives, healthcare professionals and doctors graduating in that region. It is completely foreseeable and you should plan the year with the expectation that you will hire those people at that time of the year and plan your budget. Twelve months is not that long a period to be able to plan these things. These are known factors. The Deputy is right; it is not just about the overspend. It was about the failure to recruit strategically throughout the rest of the year that led us to be in a position where there is an overspend that now places pressure on the budget and uncertainty that should not be acceptable. On 1 January, everybody knows how many people will graduate, when they will graduate and what the overall budget is. If you were running a business, you would hire strategically like that and you would not let it happen essentially by chance at the end of the year. It has to be better.