Consultants’ contract talks break down

TALKS on a new hospital consultants’ contract broke down yesterday with consultant groups accusing the Health Service Executive of making work practice changes behind their backs.

All sides met for about four hours yesterday but little progress was reported.

The Irish Hospital Consultants Association accused health employers of underhand and devious actions but the HSE claimed medical organisations were inflexible.

Dr Josh Keaveney said the HSE had failed to tell the medical organisations prior to the first round of talks two weeks ago that they had decided to scrap so-called ‘category two’ contracts for consultants at the beginning of January.

He said the change, without consultation, had completely undermined the association’s trust.

The Irish Medical Organisation said little progress had been made and there had been robust exchanges.

The IMO’s industrial relations director Fintan Hourihan said they remained unhappy with the employers’ proposal to refer the issue of pay under the new contract to the Review Body on Higher Remuneration in the Public Service.

However, the chief executive of the HSEA, Gerard Barry, said there was no reason why the talks could not continue to see if agreement on pay could be reached.

He described the position of the medical organisations as very inflexible.

On category two contracts, he said the consultants had not been told of the decision to scrap the contracts at the first talks meeting because those talks did not even progress to a stage where it was relevant.

But he said the scrapping of the contracts was consistent with the HSE’s stated aim of creating a system where consultants worked exclusively for either the public or private sectors.

Negotiations have been adjourned indefinitely while the independent chairman considers proposals to overcome the difficulties.

Mark Connaughton SC is to meet all the parties separately over the next two weeks in a bid to get the talks back on track again.

IHCA general secretary Finbarr Fitzpatrick said the HSE made unilateral changes to the consultants’ contract before negotiations on a new contract commenced on January 26 last.

Talks between the parties broke up two weeks ago over a dispute over the pay element of any revised contract, an issue that remains a major sticking point.