Chris MacManus, Sinn Féin General Election candidate Councillor, has claimed temporary agency staff spending by the Irish Health Services (HSE) is out of control according to the Irish Independent.

Councillor MacManus said: "Figures released to Sinn Féin have shown how rampant spending on temporary agency staff instead of directly employed HSE staff is financially crippling the health service.”

"The data from the HSE revealed that the health service has spent over €135 million on agency staff in the first five months of the year.”

"That is a spending of €900,000 a day on agency staff in hospitals and community healthcare organisations.”

"Since Fine Gael came to government in 2011, the health service has spent over €2.1 billion on temporary agency staff.”

Frank Farrelly President of the National Recruitment Federation commented.

“Temporary agency staff provide the flexibility and skills for the Irish Health Services (HSE) to function. Without them, the standards of care would fall and many procedures would not happen.  Most hospitals would not be able to cover shifts, putting patients at risk.

Agency workers are an effective way for a modern health service to cater for changes in demand, to manage crisis and to source niche skill sets.There are structural changes which the HSE could undertake which would result in real cost savings, targeting Agency workers is not one of them.

Temporary staffing is an accepted feature of today’s modern workplace across all sectors and regardless of the employment type, there are important advantages to employers' use of staffing agencies, including expertise, total cost, availability of workers and flexibility of resourcing to match service demands.”