It’s not incompetence, it's sabotage - Would you put people with a financial interest in running down the public health service in charge of our hospitals?Let’s put a gang of joyriders in charge of road safety. An unbelievably stupid idea? Of course it is, only someone who didn’t give a damn about road safety would even suggest it. So would you put people with a financial interest in running down the public health service in charge of our hospitals?
That’s exactly what the government has done. The Board of the Health Service Executive is full of them. Making profits is what really matters to Brian Cowan and his chums in the PDs and Green Party.
A pitiful public service forces people to buy private health insurance and use private facilities. Just over 50% of the population have done this, mostly to get just basic care without waiting years.
These are the people in charge of running down the health service.
Chairman, Liam Downey, used to be Chief Executive of the medical company, Becton Dickenson. He also sits on the executive of the bosses’ organisation, IBEC.
Another IBEC executive member is Joe Macri, European boss of computer multinational Microsoft.
Donal de Buitlier is a general manager in Allied Irish Banks.
Niamh Brennan, wife of former PD leader Michael McDowell, is an accountant, Professor of Management at UCD, and belongs to the Institute of Directors.
Eugene McCague is one of the owners of law firm, Arthur Cox, whose business clients control much of the country’s wealth. He is also a member of the Dublin Chamber of Commerce.
Neither of the two medical members of the Board actually works with people who are ill. Michael Murphy is Dean of Medicine at University College Cork and Anne Scott is Professor of Nursing at Dublin City University.
Psychologist Maureen Gaffney is also on the Board. A regular on RTE radio, she has an opinion on everything, except the state of our hospitals.
Pat Farrell is the former chief executive of Galvia Private Hospital in Galway, and current Chief Executive of the Irish Banking Federation.
Joe Mooney is a newly retired senior civil servant from the Department of Finance, and P.J. Fitzpatrick is Chief Executive of the Courts Service.
