Compensation sought for unpaid rise

Up to 500 hospital consultants have lodged papers in court seeking compensation for the State’s failure to pay higher salaries agreed in 2008, according to the Irish Medical Organisation (IMO).

Dr Peadar Gilligan, chair of the IMO consultants’ committee, said putting a figure on what individual consultants were due was “a really complex question because each of the individuals will have a different level of entitlement depending on the various parameters that are set out in their submissions to court”.

The consultants’ cases centre on a new work contract introduced in 2008 under which they were to get pay rises in exchange for giving up private practice.

The first tranche of the increase was paid but the second was withheld due to the financial crisis.

Two consultants, Dr Thomas Hogan and Dr John McDermott, successfully took a case to the Employment Appeals Tribunal.

The tribunal found non-payment of portions of their salaries amounted to an unlawful deduction under the Payment of Wages Act. Dr Hogan, a former anaesthetist, was awarded just under €100,000. Dr McDermott, an endocrinologist, was awarded €14,000. The HSE appealed the ruling to the High Court, but withdrew it in January, at the last minute.

Dr Gilligan, who was attending the IMO AGM at the weekend, said his understanding was that “things were being progressed” but that “some delaying tactics are being deployed by the Department of Health and the HSE”.

He said he hoped the cases would be adjudicated on this year.

A worst-case scenario could see about 2,000 consultants having to be reimbursed at an estimated cost of €700m.

The existing GP contract was also in the spotlight at the AGM with doctors calling on the State to invest in increased resources to support GPs working in deprived areas “recognising that the existing 40-year-old contract makes it unattractive to practice in areas of high morbidity/mortality”.

Cork City GP Dr Mary Favier said she works in Farranree/Fairhill “officially the most deprived part of the city”.

Her patients developed diabetes earlier, and high blood pressure earlier and required double the number of consultations.

“There is no recognition that patients with a higher morbidity create a higher workload,” she said.

Dr Favier said with additional GP time and additional nurse time, her practice could deliver a better service.

“It’s not about individual doctors earning more money,” she said.