Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The figures that cited by Dr. Dennedy are shocking. My views and those of my party on the NTPF are well known. It is not going to be news to the delegates that we do not think investment in the private sector will improve the public sector. Such investment has never helped the public sector and will never do so.

I would like to ask about what is being done. Representatives of the Medical Council have told the committee about the culture in which medicine is practised. When they were questioned, it became obvious that an understaffed medical facility was a tense and fraught atmosphere in which to work. The delegates from the Medical Council described the culture in which medicine was practised as almost toxic. It is not that the individuals working in the sector are toxic but that the organisation is dysfunctional. It is no reflection on the people working in it; it is more of a reflection on the system. It has been suggested some doctors and consultants who are abroad might be available to come home. I know that some of the delegates have returned from overseas and their return is most welcome. Is anything specific being done in that regard? When we speak to individual hospital managers, we learn that they use informal networks for these purposes. One such manager has told me that people with whom she was in school now have sons and daughters who are working overseas as doctors and consultants. She is working hard to try to get them to come home. Are the delegates aware of any specific measure being taken to make it attractive for consultants who are abroad to come home? Are packages being offered? Is every effort being made to attract doctors back to Ireland? Is it simply the case, as I suspect it is, that the word is out that the Irish health service is a deeply unattractive place in which to work and that Irish doctors overseas are deterred from returning home on that basis?