180 million euro down the drain

The last Government, in structural readjustment of systems, set up a body called the HSE i.e. the Health Service Executive. It is the overseeing body for the health service, kind of an independent state body type thing (Note:Independent and state being the operative contradiction here). Well they purchased a computer system to administer the payroll. The computer system cost 30 million euro. It didn’t work. Instead of going back to the company with the reciept to say it didn’t work they spent a further 120 million euro trying to get it to work. When it didn’t work they went back to the original company and spent another 30 million euros on a version of the same product that works.

It may seem like absolute madness to the outsider and it is frustrating to us taxpayers but here’s where the principle kicks in. In all the years of being oppressed we the Irish learned the value of acting stupid. Here is what most likely happened: the body (HSE) needed a computer system to operate a funtioning administration of wages. Some guy (a civil servant) in the dept of health knows some guy in a computer company. They come up with a plan to get rich. As in I’ll buy the software, you make sure it doesn’t work. I’ll authorise our guys to try and fix it. They’ll all get overtime and more money, but we’ll make sure it’s not fixed. We’ll ship it out to our mate in the private sector. He’ll get lots of money failing to fix it. We’ll come back to you complaining but it will be passed it’s gauruntee date so we’ll just have to order a new one which I’ll sanction. You’ll ship us a properly functioning one, sure all you’ll have to do is tweak a few things on the original that we ”overlooked”. It will be no work at all and we’ll make a mint. We’ll lodge the personalised money in an offshore a/c in the Cayman Islands and I’ll see you at the next Ireland match. Brilliant.