Marie Moloney (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the Chamber and I thank Senator Colm Burke for introducing this Bill. From speaking to the Senator, I know he has put an amount of work into this Bill. Given the number of malpractice cases, I find it incredible in today's climate that not all medical practitioners have adequate insurance cover. Any medical practitioner operating without adequate insurance is playing Russian roulette with his or her career. We must also bear in mind the safety and well-being of the patient, who must be protected and safe in the knowledge that if anything goes wrong there will be a financial back-up through insurance to meet his or her medical needs. The Minister spoke about putting the professional indemnity insurance certificate up on the wall or in a public space where the practitioner operates, but one still does not know what coverage the practitioner has and whether it is adequate to cover the procedures he or she is carrying out. I am sure every medical practitioner will have a certificate but the general public would not know whether it is adequate or not. I do not know whether simply putting the certificate up on the wall will work.

The Minister also said the HSE was moving to speed things up and carry out procedures. It seems to be going the opposite way in Kerry General Hospital because it has withdrawn ultrasound services from GPs so they can no longer access these services in the hospital. This means they must now refer patients to the clinic, which means longer waiting times and lists. This is a step backwards. It was time enough to send people to the consultants once they received the ultrasound readings.

I again thank Senator Colm Burke for introducing the Bill which we will, of course, be supporting. In fairness, the Senator is watching out for the interests of the general public. When we discussed the Bill, he informed me that certain practitioners were carrying out scans, etc., and that they did not have adequate insurance cover. I wonder how we will police this and how we will ensure medical practitioners have such cover. I thank the Minister for coming before us.