Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

More flexibility.

One of the things the report talks about is a payment to consultants to encourage them to move to the new contract and potentially looking at the salary levels to account for the fact they would not be doing private work. However, there is a wide variance in how much money one can make in private practice versus public work, depending on specialty. My understanding is that in emergency medicine, psychiatry, and other areas, there are very few private opportunities, but that in orthopaedics, plastics and other areas, one can make quite a lot of money. Has Dr. de Buitléir given any consideration to how one would treat specialties differently, depending on the opportunity cost, or would he do a blanket contract across the consultant body?