John Crown (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I rise to raise again today an issue I have raised previously, and on which Senator White has proposed legislation, namely, mandatory retirement in the health service. I would like to bring to the attention of my colleagues that a critical person in a specialty in Ireland has reached the age of mandatory retirement and will retire in three weeks time. I had occasion recently to speak to this fine gentleman - I will not mention his name today, although he may wish me to do so over the next week or two - at which time he pointed out to me that he is as productive as he ever was, takes part in as many international meetings as he has ever done and is writing as many papers as he ever did. According to him the hospital is having trouble finding a replacement for him and attempts are being made to replace him with two people, one of which positions remains unfilled. It is a disaster. This man does not want to retire and we need him not to retire. This perfectly fit, healthy, able and incredibly well-trained, talented and well recognised international specialist is being forced to drop his tools and become a dependant on the State. There is an urgency about this.

We have heard in the past of the difficulty filling specialist posts in hospitals, medicine and other areas.