Dr. John Farrell:

I agree with a lot of the points that have been made, particularly about corporatisation, the longer waiting times for GPs and people who cannot find GPs. They are all serious issues that are reflected in the capacity issues we addressed. As Dr. Quinlan said, there is a long-standing tradition of Irish graduates going away, getting experience in other healthcare systems and bringing back new ideas. That has happened. What we need to do now is attract them back and make sure they stay so it is as much about retention as it is about recruitment. Bringing people back is the challenge facing us now. I echo what others have said. General practice is a wonderfully rewarding career. A number of organisations within the college are very active. A continuing medical education network provides support to GPs who are working and trying to ease their workload. We also have a network providing practical supports to people trying to establish a practice so we are doing our best with the resources we have but it comes back to the issue of capacity, which we all identified. We have called for a high-level working group to address the needs we all identified and clarified by everybody in this meeting.