Ireland’s Department of Health has launched an urgent campaign seeking extra staff to work on its new Mandatory Hotel Quarantine (MHQ) team for up to a year.
This is despite the MHQ system being planned for an initial period of three months, due to expire in early June.
The call for expressions of interest for secondment to the team, circulated to Government bodies, also showed that the workload associated with the scheme led to urgent calls for additional staff to work on key areas less than two weeks after it went into operation.
In a note circulated to Public Servants on 7 April, less than two weeks after the first people checked into the hotels, the Department wrote that “the workload [associated with MHQ] has moved far beyond what is possible to continue to support within a small team”.
It continued: “Significant additional resources are urgently needed, particularly of experienced Civil Servants in policy, legal, financial procurement and legislative areas. Experience in operational management would also be extremely valuable.”
Those applying were told that at the outset, the Department had “an urgent need for additional staff” on a temporary basis for a minimum of three months “which is likely to be extended by six to nine months”.
Asked why the positions might need to be filled for up to a year, a spokesperson for the Department said that the enabling legislation was valid for three months, until early June, after which it could be extended by a resolution of both Houses of the Oireachtas (Parliament).
“Any staff assignments would ideally need to be capable of continuation in the event of the duration of the mandatory quarantine system being extended for a further period,” the spokesperson said.
It was also revealed that a Specialist Division was being established under a high-ranking official to handle MHQ within the Department, due to the scale of work involved in the project.
Dublin, 23 April 2021
