The Health Service Executive (HSE) has revealed it pays 41 separate allowances.

Senior HSE officials are have been appearing before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) to discuss the payments.

The allowances cost more than €166 million last year representing 2.6% of the total pay bill.

The body estimates that almost 37,000 staff are now in receipt of allowances.

Out of the total of 41 allowances 12 are particular to the nurses who account for 34% of all staff employed.

The PAC was also told that a significant number of the allowances involved stem from the resolution of ‘a protracted period of industrial unrest in the nursing profession’ in the second half of the 1990s.

This process also involved a number of Labour Court recommendations on the allowance issue and that the main thrust of granting these allowances was to ‘recognise the nursing staff working in areas where specialised skills were required or in areas where the nature of the work was particularly arduous’.

Decade-old allowances

Of the allowances identified 31 are legacy allowances predating the year 2000 with the majority having origins in the 1970s and 1980s.

These were granted through long-standing agreements and/or custom and practice which developed over the life of the former health board structure.

Of these 9 allowances are historic ‘red circled arrangements’ meaning these have not been paid to new employees for a period of time.

Tony O’Brien is the HSE Director-General Designate.

He says the majority of allowances date back decades.

The table below outlines the allowances: