In a pointed reference to continuing tension between the Departments of Health and Finance, the newly elected President of the Irish Medical Organisation, Dr Joe Barry, has called for "the Government as a whole" to increase funding for healthcare. Dr Muiris Houston, Medical Correspondent, reports.
"Citizens of the State and visitors to our country deserve a better service than the Government is currently prepared to fund," Dr Barry said in his presidential address to the IMO a.g.m.
"The Government would have greater confidence in the capacity of the Department of Health to deliver value for money if the health information strategy had been published in 2001 as promised," he added.
Referring to the recent high profile of public health doctors and an enhanced awareness of how they contribute to the health service, Dr Barry said it was a sad indictment of the Department that it had taken strike action to heighten this profile.
He told the meeting that there were two issues of particular concern to hospital consultants: enterprise liability and the task force on medical manpower.
"The consultant membership has major problems with enterprise liability. These relate to historical liability, financial issues, serious clinical concerns and its impact on a consultant's capacity to advocate on behalf of patients," he said.
While acknowledging that the manpower task force report had the capacity to bring about necessary change, he said: "The process by which the task force report has been drawn up and leaked . . . has caused considerable resentment among consultants and does not augur well for a partnership approach."
Turning to general practitioners, Dr Barry said that recent decisions by the Department of Health augured badly for industrial peace in the coming year. In particular he highlighted the Department's continued failure to pay out monies owed under the last partnership agreement, Sustaining Progress.
"The approach to GPs in the benchmarking process is further damaging relations. Any talk of a new contract - so badly needed - would clearly be premature until these issues are addressed," he said.