€100 million spent to plug staffing gaps at Cork hospitals since 2010

This includes more than €70 million at Cork University Hospital (CUH), which spent almost €5 million on agency workers between January and September this year.
The figures reveal that more than €35 million in total has been spent on agency nurses alone since 2010.
Bantry General Hospital spent €14.4 million and Mallow General Hospital spent €13.3 million on agency workers.
The main nursing union, the INMO, says agency nurses typically get paid 20% more than full-time public sector staff.
The union argues that it is further evidence that public sector pay in nursing and midwifery is below the real market rate, which in turn is driving the difficulties in recruiting and retaining nurses and midwives.
Cork North Central TD Jonathan O’Brien has accused the government and the HSE of wasting huge sums of public money. “The overreliance on the use of costly and more expensive agency staff is a direct result of the recruitment and retention crisis,” he said.