A PLAN BY the Irish Hospital Consultants Association (IHCA) to begin balloting members yesterday on a new contract of employment has had to be deferred.
The association decided just over a week ago to ballot members on the long-awaited new contract between April 28th and May 10th and said at that time it would be recommending to members that they accept the terms and conditions.
It announced the plan before some fine tuning of the document had been completed after being given assurances by the HSE and the Department of Health that any outstanding difficulties would be ironed out within one working week.
However, the IHCA said last night it was still waiting for a final draft of the new contracts, which addressed its outstanding concerns, and which could be issued to members with ballot papers.
Finbarr Fitzpatrick, secretary general of the IHCA, said he was disappointed that discussions on the document hadn't been wrapped up by now.
He said that, as a result, the commencement of a ballot of members had been deferred for 24 hours.
But he said he expected the final draft of the contract to be issued by employers today.
However, if it doesn't issue or if the document doesn't address all IHCA concerns, the ballot may have to be further deferred.
It is understood issues still in dispute between the parties include the salaries on offer to academic consultants including professors, of whom there are about 140 in the State.
As of now the top salary which is being offered to professors is €280,000.
However, the IHCA as well as the Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) - which also represents consultants but has not yet decided to ballot its members - feel this is insufficient. They want the figure increased to about €300,000 a year.
The man who chaired the substantive talks on the new consultant contracts between the HSE and the consultant representative bodies, Mark Connaughton SC, has been in touch with all sides in recent days trying to deal with so-called "drafting issues" in the new contract and trying to make decisions on issues still in dispute. It is expected he will report back to the parties today.
HSE sources indicated they expected a final contract document to be issued to the consultant representative bodies today and that if the salary for academic consultants still remained in dispute after that it could be referred to the Review Body on Higher Remuneration in the Public Sector adjudication.
The IHCA, however, is not keen on such a move.
Meanwhile, Fintan Hourihan, director of industrial relations with the IMO, said a number of other issues such as pension and how employers would monitor private practice by consultants in public hospitals were still in dispute.
However, he said he hoped these could be resolved in coming days.
The IMO has already said it will require all amendments being made to the new consultant contract in writing before it will ballot members.
"We are not prepared to recommend acceptance or to arrange a ballot based on verbal assurances," Mr Hourihan said.