SEVERAL TDs who attended the Mid-West meeting of general practitioners in Limerick last night said that they would not sign the proposed new contract, which has been offered to GPs, if they were in practice themselves. This was outlined in statement isssued by the National Association of General Practitioners on Tuesday evening.
Limerick TD Willie O’Dea said that nobody could contemplate signing a contract, which contained a ‘gagging’ clause. The deputy said the contract was more onerous than the one in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, which demanded a ‘pound of flesh’.
The meeting was held as part of an on-going series of meetings that are being held across the country to highlight the opposition of GPs, not just to the new contract, but the on-going FEMPI cuts which are causing a crisis in general practice.
The chair of the meeting, Dr Conor McGee, said that the on-going FEMPI cuts were discriminatory and affected elderly and more isolated people disproportionately. This is socially divisive and unacceptable.
The Clare Fianna Fail TD, Timmy Dooley, said that there was no such thing as free GP care and that someone had to pay for it. He said that he had experience of constituents at his clinic losing their medical cards because the HSE had made it more difficult to fill in forms to retain their medical card status.
The meeting was addressed by several speakers including Dr Ed Walsh, Founding President of Limerick University. Dr Walsh issued a call to the Department of Health to tell the HSE to ‘stop lying’ about the GP’s wages. Dr Walsh said that the HSE used ‘black propaganda’ to try to sway public opinion on how much doctors made.
“The average practice income is €130,000 before all expenses are paid. This is practice turnover – not income. That includes rent or mortgage, heat, cleaning, insurance, medical indemnity, practice nurses and admin staff and more. However, the HSE still puts out figures that suggest doctors are making €700,000 a year,” he said.
Limerick TD and Minister, Jan O’Sullivan told the meeting that there was ‘no way’ that the contract could be implemented as is.
A native of Ennis, Colin McGann has been editor of The Clare Champion since August 2020. Former editor of The Clare People, he is a journalism and communications graduate of Dublin Institute of Technology.