Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Independent)

One of the main recommendations of the National Task Force on Medical Staffing in 2003 was to increase the number of consultants and to implement a corresponding decrease in the number of NCHD posts in order to create a consultant-provided service. At the time of publication the consultant to NCHD ratio was 1:2.27. The task force concluded that a team-based consultant-provided service was required to ensure high quality patient care and achieve compliance with the European working time directive. It stated that this would entail a significant increase in consultant numbers.

The move to a consultant-provided service was reflected in the 2008 contract. This provided for consultants to work as part of a team over an extended working day of 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., an increase in the length of the working week and structured weekend work. It is also provided for in the HSE's employment control framework which allows for new hospital consultant posts to be created by the suppression of two non-consultant hospital doctor, NCHD, posts.

As of September 2010, the approved number of consultant posts was 2,410. This represents an increase of 679 posts, or 39%, since the task force reported. The current ratio of hospital consultants to NCHD posts is 1:1.7 compared with 1:2.27 in 2003. For comparison purposes, both ratios exclude interns.

Since 2008, the HSE has created almost 500 new or replacement consultant posts. As of June 2010, approximately 223 contracts had been issued to individuals taking up HSE consultant posts. This reduces potential vacancies to approximately 275, of which 89 consultants are currently being recruited by the Public Appointments Service. While the remaining 186 approved posts are recorded as being vacant, the large majority of these are in HSE-funded agencies, including voluntary hospitals, where the recruitment process has already taken place and the HSE has been asked to establish how many of them have been filled.

Approximately 260 of the 4,638 NCHD posts are vacant, but many of these posts, in particular high priority service positions, are being filled by locums or other short-term contractual arrangements. The moratorium on public sector recruitment is not a factor in these NCHD vacancies.

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