I wish to discuss pension abatement for retired nurses who returned to work during Covid and other workers who returned to vaccination centres, wards and community settings. They were highly experienced people. They answered the call and came back to work. They were told their pensions would not be affected. Some went into mental health into the CAMHS clinical liaison support team. They were told they could work up to 19.5 hours and it would not affect their pensions. They brought many years of experience and knowledge with them. Everything was going grand until the Department of Finance intervened sometime late in 2022 and told the HSE this would not be so and the pensions would be abated. The HSE never relayed that to its workers. The workers did not know. They continued on along in the vein they were working. The HSE HR section, especially in HSE south, told the workers everything would be all right. The story is that the Department of Finance and Revenue, the pensions side of it, are looking for money back. Some people are being asked to pay back €2,700, €4,000 or €5,000. One highly qualified individual who went back into mental health is being asked to pay back €25,000. This is totally and absolutely wrong. These workers, would you believe it, are still working through the health agencies that supply people to the HSE at an extra cost of about 25%. The work must be done - there are people with mental health problems and people in the hospitals - so the HSE is employing agency workers and it is costing 25% more. There is an embargo on hiring new nurses, which is wrong. I have raised this several times before. These people are so good that they are continuing to work. They are just getting the same amount, but the agencies are charging 25% or 30% on top of this. I ask the Ministers to look at this. I seem to have an awful lot of these people on my books. They are ringing me every day. They are ringing the office to ask if we can do something about it. I raised it here during the term of the last Government and it is still the same. People are still getting these demands. It is not fair to put them through this at this age of their life, at upwards of 70 years – many of them 71 or 72 years. It is not fair. I am asking for intervention. As new Ministers and a new Government, I ask them to deal with it and get it out of the way. I ask them to please look at the agency situation and at the case, for example, of a girl who came back to her job after three years of a career break but will not get her job back in CUH in Cork. She has been told there is no job there for her at the present time. She left her job and took a career break, and now she is not being allowed back. The Minister of State must deal with this. It is very serious to treat people like this. They came back and put their own families at risk by going out and working in vaccination centres and wards. They put themselves and their families at risk to do this for the State.

Sentiment score: -0.01

I thank the Minister of State for coming in to answer my question about this. I do not thank her for reading out the section of the reply that claims kudos for the number of extra people employed by the HSE. Clearly, the HSE, the wards and the hospitals are understaffed. Regarding this particular episode, these people who came back to work did so out of the goodness of their heart when they saw that the country was under pressure. They were told their pensions would not be affected. Then, the Department of Finance came along and said they would be affected. However, when they queried this with the HSE, they thought they were safe to work away, and this is what they did. Now it is ongoing. That is what I ask the Minister of State to sort out. It is not fair on these people. I take these people’s word because they worked for the HSE and the country, most of them for more than 40 years. There was never a question of them relenting in or not complying with their duties. This is what they are saying to me. They were told by HSE south that they were safe and to work away. After I highlighted it here in the Dáil, some of them stopped working and went to agencies to do the same work. I believe these people. I ask the Minister of State to look at what happened because clearly the HSE HR told them they were safe to stay working, and that is what they did. They did not let the people down. Some of these people were dealing one to one with patients who maybe would have committed suicide or done a lot worse. They felt an onus on themselves to keep working. When they got the nod from the HSE that they were safe and they would be sorted out with the Department of Finance, that is what they did. I want the Minister of State to sort this out and take no more tax or extra money out of their pensions.

Sentiment score: 0.08