Dr. Matthew Sadlier:

To answer Deputy Conway’s question specifically, what we feel is unnecessarily prescriptive is the administrative element of head 10. Medical procedures carried out in hospitals are already reported to the Health Service Executive and to the Department, and it is proposed that we would put them into a separate report. Head 4 relates to mental health issues, which are already a stigmatised issue to be reported. We will not stand over practitioners not practising to the highest standards. The Medical Council is the body to investigate any difficulties or complaints against practitioners. It is too prescriptive to separate it out from the procedures of clinical audit and HIPE data already being sent into hospitals and from the procedures of the Medical Council or other professional bodies around practice and is creating another level of administration and unnecessary bureaucracy.

On Senator van Turnhout’s question on conscientious objectors, as the representative body for doctors we would be insistent that our concerns regarding the use of information on whether a doctor is a conscientious objector would not become a stigmatising or discriminatory element in the interview and recruitment process to posts within hospitals.