Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On the winter plan, Nursing Homes Ireland has advised me that, as far back as May or June, it raised the fact that it wanted to be very much involved in working with the HSE on the winter plan. It wrote a letter on 30 September and received a reply on 31 October from the co-chair of the management team advising that its proposals and engagement would be discussed at the meeting in November. I understand that meeting is set for 26 November next. One of the issues Nursing Homes Ireland has raised with me - it says this happens every year - is that from 22 December until approximately the third week in January, it has very little engagement with the HSE as regards working with it and helping to relieve the numbers coming out of the hospitals. It is concerned that it has not been involved in the engagement to date on the winter plan and it is very anxious to be available and to work with the HSE so any issue in regard to numbers in hospitals can be dealt with in an expeditious manner. I would appreciate any comment on that. Nursing Homes Ireland certainly wants to work with the HSE in this regard.

The second issue I want to raise is the consultant contract and, in particular, trying to make it attractive for people to return to Ireland. I accept that we have discussed the consultant contract a few times today. We put in a new salary scale system in recent years but it is not working in many areas in the sense that people are not attracted to the jobs and the scales being offered. I raised a point earlier about the €110 million spent on the employment of agency consultants. Is this being reviewed from a Department point of view or HSE point of view to allow us to move forward?

An issue was raised earlier about the number who are going to retire from the health service right across Europe. My understanding is that something like one third of all medical consultants across Europe are over 60 years of age. Therefore, we will be facing a challenge.

In facing that challenge, we also need to be competitive in what we are offering. How can we deal with the issues? We have not been serious about dealing with it over the past three or four years. I accept that there are other demands, but we need something attractive to bring people in. Is engagement on the matter with the consultant group likely in the next six months?