Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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524. To ask the Minister for Health the reason a non-EU national junior doctor does not have the same access to training programmes as EU junior doctors; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [44226/20]

Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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The Irish health system provides a wide range of medical postgraduate training programmes, and non-EEA junior doctors are eligible to apply for these programmes.

The guidance for allocating posts outlines how EEA citizens are given the first opportunity to fill the training places, and the remaining places are then allocated to non-EEA applicants. This method of allocating posts supports the policy of achieving national self-sufficiency regarding the training of medical specialists.

The Deputy will be glad to hear that on 6 November 2020 I removed barriers to accessing postgraduate training for non-EEA qualified doctors, when I signed an order commencing Sections 97 and 100 of the Regulated Professions (Health and Social Care) (Amendment) Act, 2020.

These sections amend the Medical Practitioners Act, 2007 and remove a requirement that doctors who qualified in a non-EEA country, and who wish to commence postgraduate medical training in Ireland, must have completed an internship deemed the equivalent of that completed in Ireland.