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The following is issued on behalf of the Hospital Authority:
Members of the Hospital Authority (HA) Board discussed and endorsed at the Administrative and Operational Meeting today (June 24) the proposed settlement package offered to all serving and eligible doctors in relation to the judgement of the Court of Final Appeal (CFA).
Under the settlement offer, Consultants, Senior Medical Officers and Associate Consultants who shouldered 71% of off-site call duties (average about 1 in 5 days) will receive a one-off compensation offer of $95,000. While Medical Officers and Residents who shouldered 29% of the off-site duties (varied from no off-site call duties, 1 in 26 days to 1 in 14 days) will receive a one-off compensation offer ranging from $10,000, $18,000 or $34,000.
"With the release of the CFA ruling, it has all along been the intention to offer a settlement package to eligible doctors with a view to reaching an amicable resolution in this matter. An out of court settlement can help bring a speedy resolution without the need and trouble for both sides to incur substantial time, resources and expense in protracted and costly litigation," said the Chief Executive of HA, Mr Shane Solomon.
"The package is formulated based on a HA-wide off-site call survey conducted between April and May 2010 and the valuable views of doctors from the Doctors Reference Group and Doctor Staff Group Consultative Committee."
The settlement package is offered to around 4,500 full time doctors working in HA as at June 30, 2010.
"While rosters are complex and vary for different specialties and hospitals, a broadbrush approach has been adopted to reduce unnecessary comparison among departments and specialties," Mr Solomon said.
Mr Solomon added that the current offer should be considered together with the previous 2006 settlement package as a total package. "For staff morale reason, the total amount to be offered to a Consultant should not be more that what the frontline Associate Consultants/ Senior Medical Officers/ Medical Officers/ Residents will receive as it is generally recognised that on-site calls which are shouldered by frontline doctors are more demanding in workload than off-site calls."
Each eligible doctor will receive an individual invitation letters with details of his or her own offer around the end of August this year. They will be given one month's time to consider the offer and the earliest date that the payment can be released will be around October 2010.
The estimated total cost of the settlement package is $250 million. As there would not be extra funding for HA to cover the settlement package, the sum required will be funded within HA budget.
Mr Solomon said that HA is committed to continuously improving the employment terms and working conditions of public doctors at large. "While a lot has been done in keeping the work hours for doctors at a reasonable level, we are also working on the improvement of medical benefits for all staff, the consultant advancement exercise has been re-opened this year to reinstate the Consultant D3/D4 progression."
"For future on-call duties, doctors will be compensated in accordance with the CFA ruling and revamp of on-call duty arrangements is underway to ensure legal compliance," he concluded.
Ends/Thursday, June 24, 2010
Issued at HKT 20:53
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