Hospital consultants call off industrial action
The Irish Hospital Consultants' Association (IHCA) said last night it had made significant progress in the bitter row with the Department over an insurance malpractice scheme.
The IHCA declined to go into detail regarding last night's development, but spokesman Dr Colm Quigley said clear progress had been made and the consultants opted to accede to the minister's request to continue discussions in a bid to resolve differences.
Last night, Mr Martin expressed confidence that issues which led to the bitter and protracted dispute could be resolved to the satisfaction of both sides.
The hospital consultants held an emergency meeting last night following another day of intensive talks between the Medical Defence Union (MDU) and the Department of Health.
The sticking point during those talks was the question of who should pay for past claims yet to be settled. The consultants had threatened to reduce hospitals to emergency cover only next Monday if progress was not made. The planned industrial action would have affected 40,000 patients whose surgery and out-patient appointments would have been cancelled.
Parallel talks were held in London yesterday, involving both parties' insurance or technical representatives.
Later last night, the IHCA met MDU officials in Dublin for a progress report. Both the MDU and the Department of Health would not discuss the details of the talks. Mr Martin did say however that he expected talks would last for the next four weeks before all matters were ironed out.
The Department of Health and Children proposed a progress review in two weeks.
The row erupted after the Department of Health introduced a new enterprise liability scheme.
The MDU, which covered consultants in the past, said it may not be able to cover historic liabilities and offered €60 million to the Department of Health to take these on.
The Department of Health declined and said the liabilities could be far greater than e60m.
The IHCA stressed an agreement on historic liabilities was the only thing that would defer next week's industrial action.
