It is well known the Taoiseach has a history of signing blank cheques. The latest episode of the blank cheque written for the PPARS system is his most spectacular to date, at least of those we know about. I expect many Government members will say they know little about the PPARS system. The personnel, payroll, and related systems software project was set up in 1998 with a budget of €9 million, to be completed in three years. Seven years later the project has already cost €150 million. Some €70 million of that was paid to consultants and I understand that €50 million of that €70 million was paid to one consultancy firm.

What has the public got for its €150 million? We have a system that applies only to 37,000 staff members out of 130,000. It has not been rolled out nationally among the staff to whom the PPARS system applies. There has been widespread dissatisfaction with the system, as announced today by the Irish Nurses Organisation. This system paid one member €1 million in error, and consistently made overpayments to other members for several weeks. In the flagship hospital, St. James's, which has been involved in PPARS from the outset, the chief executive has indicated that his hospital does not want to continue with the project as it threatens the hospital's basic functioning, its credibility and its relationships with its workforce.

I have two questions for the Taoiseach and his Government. First, how the hell did the Government spend €150 million on this botched project and how did he as Taoiseach, with three Ministers for Health and Children over the past seven years, preside over this scandalous episode of Government incompetence? Second, who does he hold responsible for this debacle and what action does he propose to take on it?

I will just touch on some of the issues. The PPARS system started off first in the mid 1990s when the health boards decided they needed a better payroll system because they did not even know how many people were working for them at the time. They looked at setting up a payroll system for a number of the health boards at the time and the estimated cost was €9 million or €10 million. Early estimates changed over the three-year period from 1998 to 2000 to €17 million. The highly respected Hay organisation undertook a full appraisal and review of the level of investment that would be required to finish the project properly, during its transition from a payroll system to a whole human resource management system that would be unlike what was envisaged or presented at the outset. The initial payroll system became a system dealing with personal information, pension payments, recruitment, time management and rostering. It became an entirely different system. The Deputy's suggestion that the projected cost of the system increased from €10 million to €150 million is erroneous and unfair and should not be entertained.

Does the system work?

The Hay organisation estimated that it would cost €95 million to do the job.

The Taoiseach is using the Bart Simpson defence.

We are talking about a payroll of €7 billion and a total number of staff of approximately 140,000.

He cannot defend it.

The Hay organisation said that a reduction in absenteeism would lead to savings of €56 million per annum. After two or three years, therefore, the savings would be worth more than the entire cost of the system.

Does the system work?

The organisation also suggested that the system would lead to a reduction in staff turnover and would facilitate cost avoidance systems. The health boards tried to pull all of this together. An international IT consultancy group, Gardner, was commissioned in July 2004 to examine where the project was then. The group's report indicated that although spending was in line with the level outlined by the Hay organisation three years earlier, the costs were rising. The Gardner group wrote to the project team outlining some of these issues. The reality is that the system being put in place to replace the payroll system was quite complex because it dealt with many matters relating to 140,000 members of staff and a payroll of €7 billion. The Hay organisation pointed out that if the system had been put in place correctly for €150 million, it would be a ten-year system dealing with approximately €70 billion. If it had worked correctly, that would have been fine. Unfortunately, just 40,000 of the 140,000 health service personnel have been brought under the system. It has been suggested that it would cost €55 million to finish the system by the end of March 2006. I know the sums sometimes come as a problem to Deputy Kenny——

The Taoiseach should know about sums being a problem.

——but it was never intended that the system would cost €10 million.

At least I did not falsify my degree.

The cost of the system, as envisaged by the Hay organisation in 2001, was €95 million. Some €116 million was spent up to the end of last year. It would cost another €55 million, more than €20 million of which would be a staff cost, to finish the system in its entirety. Unfortunately, if 100 people work on a system, one must pay them. That might be a difficulty for Fine Gael, but on this side of the House we believe in paying public servants.

We believe in that too.

The Government believes in paying them €1 million.

Allow the Taoiseach to conclude.

It is amazing that everything can be blamed on Fine Gael.

The system is not finished adequately. Deputy Kenny finished by asking me to state who I feel is responsible for this difficulty. The 11 health boards found that they could not put a payroll system together.

They are gone.

Thankfully, the Government established the HSE.

The system is the same.

It is obvious that a single organisation is responsible for ruling the 140,000 staff. A review of the matter is under way in the HSE——

It is the same crowd under a different name.

——which has a good executive, chairman and chief executive. We have confidence in the HSE.

That is more waffle.

I would like to make a final point.

Is this comedy hour?

Deputy Kenny tried to say that it is an IT system. It is not an IT system.

It is a system that does not work.

It is a human resource system being developed for the entire HSE into the future. A large part of it is working.

It is not working.

The firm in question,Deloitte & Touche, did not get the money just for consultancy. It implemented the system, trained 140,000 staff and tried to put the entire system together. That is what the money was paid for. We should have more honesty. There are difficulties with the system, but we should not have presentations, either here or elsewhere, which are totally dishonest.

A donkey is always a donkey.

I have rarely heard such rubbish as the Taoiseach's defence of this system.

The Deputy does not like the truth.

He has blamed the consultants, he has blamed the health boards, he has blamed the workers and he has blamed the nurses for not working regular hours.

He has blamed Fine Gael.

I have not blamed anyone.

He has blamed everybody except the Government. There have been three Ministers for Health and Children — Deputy Cowen, Deputy Martin and Deputy Harney — during the seven years in which the Taoiseach has sat in the Taoiseach's chair. They approved the budget for the system under discussion on an annual basis. They knew of and approved the increases in the Department of Health and Children's capital budget for IT facilities for the various health boards. Although they approved the increases, they are now shedding responsibility for them. It seems that the taps have been turned on in every Department, because a great deal of hand-washing is taking place. It is the same old story. Nobody on the Government side is willing to accept responsibility for anything, but they will dance to the tune of every PR firm in the country when it is necessary to open this, that and the other.

Hear, hear.

Does the Taoiseach stand over this system? Why was the system not designed with the needs of those who will use it in mind? Can the Taoiseach confirm that contracts were sent out with the tender documentation, saying what the Department had estimated in the first place, what it wanted from the system and the conditions that applied to it? What were the incentives? What were the penalties that were to apply if the system was not delivered on time? Is it not a fact that officials from the Department of Finance, after a single meeting, raised serious concerns about the services being provided by one consultant? They said that if the consultant's focus was to be at the detailed level, the average day rate was inappropriate. The Taoiseach is aware that the average day rate for trainees is between €1,000 and €3,000 per day. That means that the firm in question is paid €70,000per diem. The Taoiseach is standing over that botched system, which deals with just one third of the workforce of the health service, without any sense of responsibility.

Shame.

It is like something one would hear at a tribunal.

It is clear what should have happened. There should have been fixed price contracts. Conditions of contract should have been sent out with the tender documentation. Above all, there should have been oversight. The Minister for Health and Children of the day and the Taoiseach as the leader of the Government of the day should have accepted responsibility. None of those things happened, however. The Taoiseach cannot walk away from his responsibility in this regard. He cannot shove it over to Professor Drumm and the HSE. The €150 million spent on it would have delivered a brand new 60-bed hospital. It could have been spent on doubling the home help budget, thereby providing a valuable community service to elderly people and people with disabilities. If the €150 million had been spent where it matters most, it could have been used to make a real difference to waiting lists in accident and emergency departments, for example. The Government should have ensured that it got value for the money provided by the people through their taxes, but instead there has been a shameful waste of taxpayers' money.

Hear, hear.

It is even more shameful the Taoiseach and his Government will not accept an iota of responsibility for this debacle, which can be added to the litany of dishonour that has developed during the Administration's seven years in office. The Government prefers to shove responsibility to Professor Drumm and carry on regardless. Its ethics are "get in here and stay in here", but the people have a different view.

Hear, hear.

The members of the Government should resign.

Deputy Kenny started his contribution by saying that the Government is totally responsible, but he then said we are trying to pass the buck totally. He cannot have it both ways.

He is right in both instances.

People know the truth.

The Taoiseach has given us some more waffle.

The HSE is conducting a review of the system, as planned and put together over the past seven or eight years, to see whether it is capable within a reasonable cost of providing a modern management system for the health service's 140,000 staff and its annual payroll of €7 billion. The details of just 40,000 staff have been placed on the system to date. It has been estimated that a further €55 million will be required to complete the project. That the HSE is trying to use a manual system and a computerised system at the same time has caused a large part of the problem. The huge variations between the systems in place in the 11 health boards which were brought together to form the HSE has led to this problem. It has not yet proved possible to solve that in an easy way. The system was evaluated. It is incorrect for the Deputy to say it was not evaluated properly in the first place. The ICT system in question——

The Taoiseach said earlier that it is not an IT system.

——was procured following an EU tendering process and international evaluations.

He said it a few minutes ago.

I would like to respond to Deputy Kenny. The system was extended considerably after the procurement process was completed. The Hay report stated that considerable savings could accrue if the system could be made to work. Modern organisations require top-class systems. The system in question is used here by several multinational businesses.

What did it cost them?

However, because of the enormous number of grades — there are close to 26,000 coded grades across the health service — it is simply not compatible with what they are doing. Last October and again this year, the Health Service Executive, with officials of the Department of Finance, stated several times through the news media that it was reviewing the system. It does not intend to dump the system; it is reviewing it to see whether it can find another way to add the remaining numbers. It is a major problem that requires a modern single system that can deal with the payroll for 140,000 staff. Nobody will dump on the HSE. The Government will work with the HSE to try to improve the health service.

The Taoiseach is passing the buck to it.

I remind Members that when we raised issues of accountability in this House during the establishment of the HSE, it was those on the other side of the House who said there was too much accountability. We will work with the HSE to deal with this system so that we achieve a modern organisation, properly constituted, with 140,000 staff, and spending €7 billion per annum. We will continue with that process. Nobody will walk away from it.

What about the Minister, Deputy Harney, or the former Minister, Deputy Martin?

The Government could use the voting machines. They might do better.

The Taoiseach suggested the technology is not to blame. I accept there is probably nothing wrong with the PPARS technology. The problem is with the implementation of the technology, which is the Taoiseach's responsibility. No matter how much he wriggles and tries to avoid and evade his responsibility, it is his responsibility. He and the Government are responsible for gross incompetence and for squandering millions of euro in the health service that is desperately needed elsewhere. Regrettably, it is not just the PPARS system that is not working. When we consider the record of his appointed Minister for Health and Children after 12 months, it is clear she is not working either.

I invite the Taoiseach to examine the analysis of the 12 month record of the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children which the Labour Party published today. She promised to deal with the accident and emergency crisis; it is now worse than ever. She promised 30,000 full medical cards; not one of those cards has been issued. She promised 200,000 general practitioner only cards, which were to be provided last April; not one of those cards has been issued. During her term of office, every piece of accountability has been stripped out of the health service. We cannot even get an answer to a Parliamentary Question.

Hear, hear.

The Government passes the buck.

At local level, people are making decisions about the lives of others yet they are not accountable to anybody in any democratic sense. That is the record of the Minister for Health and Children appointed by the Taoiseach. Old folks in nursing homes, waiting for the money which was robbed from them, are told they will have to wait until next year, despite previously being told they would get it this autumn. Despite all the urgency expressed with regard to the Leas Cross issue, when the Taoiseach and Tánaiste were going to do the devil and all, what has happened? Nothing has happened. The legislation is not in place to deal with the central issues in the health service.

When will the Taoiseach get his act together? When will the Government stop squandering money and appoint somebody who can do the job to the position of Minister for Health and Children?

I reiterate that Professor Drumm and his colleagues have worked for some months in consultation with the Department of Finance to examine the difficulties with trying to bring a full system to fruition. The correspondence between them is available under freedom of information legislation and is in the public domain.

This is after eight years of Fianna Fáil-PD Government.

The system was not implemented until 2002. The HSE is endeavouring to solve this. Whether it is exactly this system or an alternative system, or the system that applies to 40,000 staff, with some change to the system for the other 100,000 staff, it is vital a coherent system is found. The HSE has used an EU evaluation system and the best consultants in the country — the Hay organisation and others — to try to achieve this.

Who was in charge before Professor Drumm?