Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The concern is speed because we are facing a crisis. As some senior hospital consultants said to me just last week, the public hospital system is now on fire. It is great that we have, notionally, 3,100 consultants but there are approximately 400 unfilled positions, more than are 300 locums included in the number and there are at least 150 non-specialists acting in specialist roles. When one counts all of that, there are not 3,000 but closer to 2,000 consultants. Even if we had the 3,000 posts all filled by full-time, fully qualified specialists, which we do not, the number of consultants would still be approximately 43% below the EU average. We have a chronic shortage of doctors and the reality is that people are waiting longer in Ireland than in any other country in Europe to see doctors. It worries me when I hear language to the effect that "we will put a process in place" because these are the kinds of things that can take years. Does the Minister accept that we have an immediate crisis in terms of a shortage of hospital consultants and that something needs to be done urgently to address that, including dealing with pay disparity?

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