Simon Harris appeals to medical graduates to stay in Ireland

Minister for Health Simon Harris has appealed to young people to remain in Ireland and work in the health service.

“I appeal to people, in particular our young graduates from nursing and medical school, to work with us and to give the Irish health service a chance as we enter a period of reinvestment,” he said.

He was replying in the Dáil to Sinn Féin health spokeswoman Louise O’Reilly, who said she understood Ireland was losing consultants and other health professionals as fast as they were coming in due to the poor quality of the working environment.

Mr Harris said the HSE’s staffing environment was dynamic and subject to significant service demands.

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When a position was vacated, work may be covered through a variety of measures, such as redeployment, restructuring or reallocation, he said.

The HSE, he said, did not operate a vacancy rate, but rather recorded a staff turnover rate.

Turnover rate

It was estimated that the adjusted turnover rate for last year was 5.7 per cent.

That meant that each year at any one time people would be moving in and out of about one in 20 posts across the health service.

This could be for a range of reasons, with people simply moving to a new location while remaining within the HSE.

Other reasons included retirement, resignation or taking up other types of leave such as maternity leave.

He said the estimated 200 consultancy posts, vacant at any one time, were filled on a locum or agency basis to ensure continued service delivery.

The number of consultants in the service had increased by more than 700 in the past decade, said Mr Harris.

The Minister said there were over 36,000 nursing and midwifery staff members in employment at the end of July.

Global competition

This was an increase of more than 700 in the past 12 months, against a backdrop of intense global competition, he said.

Mr Harris said under the agreement reached with the nursing unions earlier this year, the HSE had developed a funded workforce plan for an additional 1,224 nursing and midwifery posts this year.

Ms Reilly said pay was not the only issue, adding that a poor working environment was also a factor.

She said the Minister should ensure the workplace was more appealing.

"We will not be in a position to implement the maternity strategy, or any of the other documents that sit gathering dust on shelves in the Department of Health, unless we have the staff to do so,'' Ms Reilly added.