Health service employers and hospital consultants have entered talks today on proposed new contracts for hospital consultants.
The talks on the controversial proposals to change the conditions under which newly appointed consultants will operate are taking place at the offices of the Health Services Employers' Agency in Dublin.
Talks began at 10.30am and were scheduled to continue throughout today. Another meeting is scheduled for tomorrow.
Earlier this month, the Government set a seven-week deadline for a deal on contracts to be concluded successfully, meaning a deal will have to be done by March 27th.
Five days have been set aside for this round of talks, but consultant representatives have expressed doubt that a deal can be struck within that time.
Finbarr Fitzpatrick, general secretary of the Irish Hospital Consultants' Association (IHCA), which represents most consultants in the State, recently said the seven-week time frame was unrealistic.
He said this was because full details of a new contract have yet to be put on the table. Only a draft contract was presented last November by the Health Service Executive (HSE); when a core contact is agreed for the majority of consultants, a number of versions of it will have to be agreed for academics in medicine and dentistry.
Minister for Health Mary Harney wants to see more specialist doctors working exclusively in public hospitals under any new agreement.
The majority of hospital consultants in the State will not be able to work in the new co-located private hospitals to be built on public hospital sites under their existing contract arrangements, HSE chief executive Prof Brendan Drumm has confirmed.
He said current holders of what are called "category one" contracts - some 70 per cent of consultants - will not be entitled to work in the new hospitals under existing contracts.
While these contracts allow them to do private practice in the public hospitals they work in, they will not extend to them working in co-located private hospitals to be built on eight public hospital sites under plans announced in 2005 by the Minister for Health.
Around 600 of the 2,100 consultants in public hospitals have contractual rights to see fee-paying patients in off-site private hospitals.
Currently, consultants are committed to working 33 hours per week in public hospitals, although many work much longer hours.