To approve. In other words the council cannot fix a registration fee except with the consent of the Minister. I think the Minister will accept that that is still a control. The other control is that under the 1951 Act introduced by the Minister's predecessor, this country was brought into alignment with conditions that exist in Britain whereby on the conclusion of the ordinary curriculum it is necessary for a practitioner, before he is accepted for registration, to serve an internship in a recognised hospital for a period of 12 months or a period to be agreed upon by the examining bodies or the Registration Council itself. The position as it stands now is that the Minister has still the controlling influence in that. I would like to try to bring home to the Minister this point of view: In the first instance, with regard to the control of the medical registration fee it seems to me that it is unnecessary to have ministerial control there.
It might be that these controls would be necessary in other associations such as those of the Veterinary Surgeons and Dentists but there does not seem sufficient reason for them in matters of health. The position as at present obtaining is that the Medical Registration Council is financially independent of the State. They are receiving no finances at all from the State as they were when these rules and regulations were laid down in the Act. If we come to study the set-up of the present council we will see that it consists of a representative of all the examining bodies—those who are qualified to give a degree to anyone practising—Dublin University and the University Colleges in Dublin, Cork and Galway, the Royal College of Surgeons and the Royal College of Physicians. Added to that you have two members of the medical profession and two members appointed by the Government. It seems to me that the two members appointed by the Government should be an adequate safeguard.
Apart from that altogether it seems to me that it would be in the interests of this body to charge a reasonable fee, because if they do not do so they will be cutting off their nose to spite their face, since they themselves are the examining body and since it is in their interests to have as many people as possible competing for medical registration. If there were higher fees there would be fewer people competing. As long as you have controls you must have the Civil Service personnel to deal with them.
I think we will all agree that in this country as in the world as a whole the greatest difficulty is that when any establishment is set up there is immediately the necessity for an increase in the Civil Service personnel. I feel sure you will want to avoid that as far as possible. There must be a considerable file dealing with these matters in the Department of Health. I think that the time has come when the Minister can say: "Carry on; I do not want any more to do with you." He has two representatives on the council. This council have all the facilities necessary at their disposal; they have all the knowledge appertaining to medical education and so forth, so that does not seem necessary for the Minister to come along now with this. One would think that he would say: "You are free from all control. Carry on." This Bill was originally introduced for the purpose of freeing the Medical Registration Council from State control.