Dr. Diarmuid Quinlan:

We are very clear. We have very good research from Ireland showing that when children aged under six got free access to GPs their consultation rates went up 30%. This is to be welcomed because the evidence also shows that these children who had to pay for access to their GP were actually consulting below the international norms for seeing their GP. It was not that these children became excessively consulting; they actually reached the international norms. While we would support increased access to general practice we need to recognise that there is currently very substantial constraint capacity within the system and increasing demand in a constrained system is a very difficult proposition.