Madam, - While Mary Harney deserves credit for finally taking on the consultants, am I the only person astonished by the suggested pay scale of over €200,000 a year for a 40-hour week? This is chief executive pay for staff who should be the foot-soldiers of our health system. The fact that consultants would find this "offensive" indicates the extent to which the current arrangement is to their advantage.
The idea that consultants should be compensated for forgoing the right to treat private patients is beyond belief. Their pay should follow the rule of the market: let them be paid the minimum it takes to attract a sufficient number of them to do the job.
That won't be cheap; these are highly mobile professionals who are in high demand. However, given international pay scales, I would be astonished if the 1,500 posts could not be filled over a few of years with a pay level in the region of €100,000 to €130,000.
The beleaguered health system looks as if it will finally shake off one bad contract. Let us hope the Minister and the HSE don't walk us into another one. - Yours, etc,
RONNIE O'TOOLE, Donabate, Co Dublin.
Madam, - Now that the Minister for Health has obtained approval for the immediate appointment of hundreds of extra consultants, could I urge her to obtain Cabinet approval for the immediate creation of 1,500 extra beds to alleviate the acute bed shortage? The current policy of using elective beds to alleviate the crisis in casualty departments is making life hell for sick patients and front-line doctors.
I acknowledge that many of these patients are transferred to the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF), but this is another cost to the taxpayer and in the case of a cataract operation alone it can cost upwards of €3,000 for one eye. The NTPF has indeed resulted in many more operations being done and many new private facilities being set up, but I feel it will shortly confine the public system to providing only acute care. Fifteen hundred consultants at a cost of €1 billion will be wasted.
I had high hopes that Ms Harney would reduce bureaucracy, halt the proliferation of review bodies and all those other talking shops that have so bedevilled the system. I hoped that she would put more of the existing doctors and nurses on the beat and that she could introduce front-line efficiency on the lines so well illustrated by Sir Gerry Robinson in his BBC programme on the National Health Service in Britain.
Unfortunately this Minister has lost her way and is blaming doctors for her failure. Her proposals to reform the Medical Practitioners Act will remove its independence and make doctors an extension of the Department of Health. I feel this Minister sees this as payback time for the doctors of Ireland. - Yours, etc,
Prof MICHAEL O'KEEFFE, Mater Private Hospital, Eccles Street, Dublin 7.
Madam, - May I be so bold as to presume that Ms Harney et al have an immediate source for the 1,500 consultants which appear to be a panacea for all the problems of our beleaguered health system? No such massive cohort of adequately trained individuals currently exists. The issue of training the junior and senior house staff who shall form this group is being blissfully ignored by the Department of Health, the HSE and local hospital administrations. Is the Department of Health determined that the political gesture matters more than the ensured delivery of quality care?
If the current policy is followed through we may see a group who are consultants in name only, inadequately trained and lacking in ancillary staff, but appointed at all costs to satisfy a political prerogative. In short, perfect scapegoats. - Yours, etc,
Dr FINBAR MacCARTHY, Rockbarton Road, Galway.