Twomey critical of 'all-powerful consultants'

Medical consultants were sharply criticised by Fine Gael health spokesman Dr Liam Twomey during a debate on the report on the maternity unit at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda.

"There will be no cultural change in the medical services unless we make it happen. As a doctor, I am disgusted by what I read in the report about the actions of one doctor and the support given to him by other consultants. Dr Michael Neary's reign of destruction was allowed to continue due to complicity, misplaced loyalty and fears of authority and the possible consequences for anyone who spoke out."

Dr Twomey, a Wexford-based GP, said doctors, nurses, administrators and members of the Medical Missionaries of Mary could be implicated in Dr Neary's actions. "Not all are as guilty as the media alleges, however. Many areas of the Irish health services continue to be extremely stressful environments which inspire loyalty among colleagues. Unfortunately, the isolation and the bunker mentality, noted in the report, are a consequence of not applying checks and balances to the system. The Government, particularly the Tánaiste, has a role to play in this matter."

Dr Twomey said that the leadership in the hospital, from consultants and nuns to management, was completely inadequate, as were the management systems in many other parts of the health services.

"Consultants in the Irish health services hold as much power today as they did when Dr Neary ran the maternity department in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital."

Dr Twomey said that having worked in eight different hospitals, he did not consider junior doctors as the villains. "I was never in a position to stand up to the all-powerful consultants who dictated career pathways. No- body questioned them because careers could be finished by doing so. These consultants continue to control the careers of junior doctors, be they Irish or non-national. However, consultants from outside the hospital and weak management systems exacerbated the problem."

Earlier, Minister for Health Mary Harney said the report was more akin to a novel set in the dark early part of the last century than the story of the enlightened, successful, confident country in which people now lived.

Labour spokeswoman Liz McManus said there was a pressing need for protection for whistle-blowers. "If health staff working in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital over 24 years of Dr Neary's practice had been protected in this way, the likelihood is he would have been stopped from injuring women much earlier than he was."