asked the Minister for Health whether he will amend the terms of the Departmental circular M.H. 97/47 addressed to local authorities so as to include established mental hospital personnel employed as herds and ploughmen who have also the responsibility for supervision of patients, and whose wages hitherto were always relative to that of male nurses.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Mental Hospital Employees.
The circular referred to indicated revised scales of remuneration which might be adopted for certain mental hospital attendants and nurses.
In accordance with the terms of the circular, where the local authority was satisfied that a person who had been transferred to a non-nursing post was an attendant or mental nurse, and where such non-nursing post had up to then carried a scale of salary based on the remuneration of an attendant or mental nurse, the revised scales suggested for attendant and mental nurses might be applied to such non-nursing posts.
The remuneration of employees of mental hospital authorities who are recruited as herds or ploughmen is related to the current local rates, the minima of which are fixed from time to time by the relevant orders of the Agricultural Wages Board.