The chief executive of Manx Care says that the health body is not being allowed to operate as it wants due to political interference.
Speaking at a siting of the Public Accounts Committee, Teresa Cope said that even modest or minor changes have been blocked.
When Manx Care was set up, a large part of the justification for it was that it would take over the day to day running of the island’s health and social care services, with the department taking up a strategic role.
However, Ms Cope’s evidence suggests that this is proving not to be the case.
Minor
Chair of the PAC Juan Watterson SHK asked Ms Cope to explain what she meant when she told the media that she believed its arms-length structure had been undermined by politicians.
She said that Manx Care had been publicly criticised for its overspending and for making operational decisions to remain within the £15.8m overspend.
The CEO also said that it was asked by the department not to issue its planned press release about service cuts while “changes to how it was communicated and indeed whether further mitigations could be put in place were explored”.
She did however note that the DHSC cannot veto her decisions, but this is not how she or Manx Care wants to operate.
Respectful
“We have always tried to be incredibly respectful and recognise that whilst we are arm’s length and operational decisions are for Manx care to make, and we are all health and care professionals with significant amount of experience, we recognise the impact of those decisions politically,” Ms Cope said.
She added: “We have always attempted to work collaboratively, but equally, I do know from trying to do this job for the last four years that even the most modest and minor changes that we would wish to make, which make clinical sense, operational sense, and ordinarily would be the actions any organisation would take in order to manage and control its costs are not permitted and so I think you know that dilemma is at the heart of all of this.”
Straining to remain diplomatic, Ms Cope added that there are “areas where Manx Care effectively is not able to necessarily exhibit the arms length appropriate controls it has to make”.
Giving the example of a commissioning decision about a particular drug or a particular vaccine, that decision is not taken by Manx Care, but the cost implications are, means Manx Care is often liable for financial decisions it doesn’t make.
Relationship
Sean Stacey, an Improvement director at Manx Care, also noted that the entire recent situation has demonstrated the need for a clearer understanding of how Manx Care functions within the department.
He also warned that when the board of Manx Care is “disempowered” by politicians, it leads to situations where there is no long term benefit and even potentially a short to medium term harm to using additional funding.
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