Ivana Bacik (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for his response. I join him in wishing the Taoiseach well on his retirement. I offer best wishes to him, his wife, Fionnuala, and his family. However, I am disappointed with the substance of the Minister's reply, which does not bring matters forward in any way. Indeed, it simply re-states a decision that had previously been made by the former Minister, Senator James Reilly, some years ago and which was re-stated in August 2015 by the then Minister, Deputy Varadkar. It appears that nothing has changed. In 2015, the then Minister, Deputy Varadkar, told The Medical Independentthat legislation was being drafted at that time. It is a simple amendment to the 2007 Act.It is not a huge Bill, as I understand it.

The Minister of State also raised an important ethical issue, which is that currently we are poaching doctors from developing countries without offering them any opportunity to increase their specialisation or to train in a recognised training structure here. That is why we are losing people and that is why we cannot retain or recruit sufficient numbers of qualified doctors to bring down our horrendous waiting lists in the health system. I know that the Minister of State is a passionate advocate for reform in the health system. This is a very simple reform and I do not see how the Minister for Health can say that the timeframe is to publish the Bill by the end of 2017, subject to no major issues arising. This is an urgent matter. One of the organisations that has consistently highlighted this is Overseas Medics of Ireland. Its former general secretary, Dr. Shakya Bhattacharjee, emigrated to the UK from Ireland out of frustration and to access a training post in neurology there. We cannot keep the doctors that we need here and that has a knock on effect on our own people, as well as on the developing countries from where we are poaching doctors. I will continue to raise this and I will also rely on Deputy Alan Kelly to raise it in the Dáil. I ask the Minister of State to bring the message back to the Minister for Health that this must be dealt with more urgently than is currently the case.