Alex White (Dublin South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I reiterate that we have discussed the issue of certainty. We all recognise that it is very difficult to attain certainty in practically any part of this area of discussion. We want to strive for and to achieve it as best we can. I agree with Deputy Mulherin that there is an element of subjectivity in the notion of good faith. It has a high measure of subjectivity in the sense that one cannot look into another person's mind. I suppose one could perhaps demonstrate afterwards that the circumstances proved that the person was not in fact acting in good faith. To return to the point being suggested, that we insert the phrase "best medical practice", one would have to define medical best practice. One could not possibly leave a phrase such as "best medical practice" at large; it would have to be defined. How it would be defined could only be based on the tools already available, which are the standards set by the professions that are sometimes tested in cases of medical negligence. If this committee or any committee were to sit down and put together a booklet of what constitutes best medical practice, whom would we ask? We would have to ask the professional bodies and the colleges of practitioners, the GPs, the psychiatrists, the obstetricians and gynaecologists. We would have to bring them to the committee and ask their opinion of what is best medical practice in any particular instance. We would have to take it down in longhand and put it into the booklet because we would not be able to second-guess that.