Sir, - I refer to the withholding of pension entitlements to retired hospital consultants referred to by Dr Linehan (July 20th) and wish to advise that the Irish Medical Organisation continues to actively seek resolution to this injustice.
So strongly do today's generation of hospital consultants feel about the delay in resolving this matter that they are now saying that the Department of Health obviously expects and will respond to the threat of industrial action by consultants.
At a time when an industrial relations audit is taking place in the health service and following a dozen major disputes over the last three to four years in the health service, it seems that problems are only addressed when threats of industrial action are received. Such a practice would represent nothing less than abject cynicism in the case of retired consultants who are clearly being left in a vulnerable position as a result of the unacceptable delay in resolving this particular dispute.
Commitments given at the last round of negotiations on the consultants' common contract to resolve the question of pensions payments for those who retired prior to 1991 have been left in abeyance. The matter has also been raised by the IMO in the context of the current Buckley review on remuneration for consultants and others.
In all our representations to the Department of Health and Children seeking a meeting on this matter, we have received a steady stream of reasons why it is not possible at this time to arrange such a meeting. Ultimately, we are told that wisdom of the mandarins in the Department of Finance is awaited and when this arrives then such a meeting can take place.
Since last autumn we have continuously been told by various official sources that this matter will be discussed with the IMO presently, yet here we are towards the end of July still awaiting a meeting.
Having addressed and met with the retired consultants, including Dr McCooey, in that time and having to explain to the spouses and families of those same retired consultants that we are sure the mandarins will make good their commitment to discuss and resolve this matter imminently has proven to be increasingly distressing and disillusioning for all those who have tried to resolve this matter.
The great shame of this debacle has been the manner in which consultants, who were forced to work in conditions which are hard to imagine today, are treated with such lack of gratitude and consideration. And as the revelations from Dublin Castle make more gruesome reading with each passing day, the contempt shown towards groups such as these retired consultants becomes yet more difficult to stomach. - Yours, etc.,
Fintan Hourihan, Director of Industrial Relations, Irish Medical Organisation, Fitzwilliam Place, Dublin 2.