“Not My Fault” and thus ‘Not my Responsibility’ - Bertie

Loving the logic involved in this one. Bertie was being put up to it over the debacle of cancer care in the Midlands and brought out that streak that has become so much more apparent since the election victory. In questions from Eamon Gilmore, Ahern refused to take the heat for the mix up in the service which led to misdiagnoses of patients in the Midlands. In doing so he pointedly blamed the consultants involved. One may argue more in the sense of human error that taking another swipe at the profession though like all he says, its shrouded in ambiguity;

“I am not here to answer on the consultants of this country when they are in their operating theatres. We provide modern facilities to very well paid people in this country, the vast majority of them have far more excessive salaries than me.”

He refused to accept that it was his responsibility. They put the money in and the others screwed up. Implicitly he suggested that there is some sort of compartmentalisation at play here, he and his government have stumped up nearly E15 billion a year, they have done their bit and put infrastructure in place. The staff have to toe the line in this equation and work to the best of service possible.

On the face of it, there are many who would have sympathy with some or all of his assertion. However what it seems to suggest is that the role of government is simply the provision of funding. Once the arrangements are made and money is spent, the follow up is someone elses department. Perhaps that is why we have so many cock-ups, so few resignation and so jaundiced an opinion of politicians. I understand that he may balk at taking personal responsibility for this but yet again, in a fashion echoing the Bray firefighters and the Ministerial pay-rise which will be trundling towards them as we tighten our belts.

Yet the logic here is of some sort of commissioning body with no responsibility for any outcome that results from the commitment which is implicit in spending cash. There is no responsibility if money is spent on services which malfunction, throw people on trolleys etc. This logic is the worst kind of abdication of public responsibility. At least privatisation is intended to include metrics for service provision which the private contractor must meet. This is carte blanche to piss money down the drain. Again, one can only read so much into Ahern when he speaks. Yet it seems the logic he is working through chimes with the manner in which government acts, we only need to look at the HSE. If that is the case, one fears there is more chickens en-route to the nest.