John Crown (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I again welcome my colleagues. With respect to my previous question on accountancy numbers which was very technical, I am very happy with the written answer provided and do not require any further clarification on the matter.

I would welcome a little discussion on the graduate nursing scheme, with which I am slightly troubled. It appears to be implicit in the philosophy behind the scheme that there was some type of deficit or lack of experience among the nurses coming into the system. This was to be remedied by these candidate nurses coming into the graduate scheme through an intermediate job where they will get additional education. When was this first flagged as a problem, as it is certainly not one that was obvious to me? If the logic of the scheme is that it is remedying an experience deficit, then surely the logic of the scheme extends to the point that when they achieve the experience, they stay in the system in full jobs as fully experienced and trained nurses. If, however, they rotate out of the jobs, as will happen, to be replaced by additional graduate scheme nurses, then we will just have a continuously rotating pool of people coming in without experience. If we are trying to address an experience deficit, it seems to me there is a failure of logic in that approach.

There is another interpretation which can be put on this. By having a continuous pool of graduate nurses coming in on a different payscale, who are doing the same work that fully trained and experienced nurses were doing before, we are recalibrating the lower market salary scale for nurses. In fact, this is attempting, by fiat, to distort the normal market for nurses coming into post.

In addition, there is a real corollary to this. If these posts are different from the full posts which occur following completion of the graduate scheme, then they should have a substantial educational component. In talking to and canvassing the opinions of nurses in the scheme to date, there is a perception that this is not the case as yet. Will the Minister clarify for me what the exact extent of the scheme was and what are the plans to firm up the educational arrangements?

Is Mr. O’Brien happy that the board structures of many of our hospitals which provide a service in the public sector, particularly our voluntary hospitals, are elected and comprised in an appropriate fashion? Alternatively, are they self-perpetuating oligarchs which act to represent the interests, partly, of the institution but, partly, of other interests who no longer run the institutions? The latter is my perception. Will there be any attempt to get a match between the actual accountability of the board structures of our public hospitals and those who actually pay for them?