THE FAILURE of health service employers to furnish unions with a final written draft of the new contract agreed with hospital consultants almost two months ago may be because the Health Service Executive (HSE) has no money to appoint new consultants under the terms of the new agreement, the Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) has claimed.
Dr Seán Tierney, chair of the IMO's consultant committee, said members had waited since the end of January for an agreed document and there was still no sign of it.
"We have some concerns that this process is being deliberately delayed by the HSE, who actually want to save money. I mean all we've heard from the HSE in the last three months has been: 'We need to save money'," he said.
"We need to get this thing moved on. We've made ourselves repeatedly available over the last number of weeks and there have been no meetings in relation to the consultant contract for three weeks now."
Fintan Hourihan, director of industrial relations with the IMO, said that the employers had now been given until the end of the month to produce the document.
The IMO is hoping that it can be received in time for its annual conference in Killarney, which begins on March 27th.
"I think if we don't get the document in time . . . it will only confirm our suspicion that they are quite deliberately stalling this whole process. In the last number of weeks, it's clear to us that they are reneging on areas of agreement which had been provisionally agreed over the past 18 months and they are now also looking to insert new demands into a revised contract . . ," he said.
The comments came at a press conference in Dublin in advance of the IMO's annual meeting. Dr Paula Gilvarry, IMO president, said doctors attending the meeting would express despair at the management of their health service.
Last night, a HSE spokesman said the drafting of the new consultants contract was ongoing and it was not being delayed because of any budgetary difficulties.