James Reilly

James Reilly (born 16 August 1955) is an Irish former Fine Gael politician, businessman and medical doctor who served as a Senator from May 2016 to March 2020.

Reilly graduated with a medical degree from the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland in 1979 and is a qualified General Practitioner.

Reilly was president of the Irish Medical Organisation prior to his election.

He was a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dublin North constituency from 2007 to 2016.

Compared to salaries from 2008, the cut represents over a 40% drop, the largest cut in the public sector.

Controversially, this salary cut applied to not only new consultant contracts but also to existing consultants who moved to take up a similar position in a different hospital.

Since this pay cut there has been difficulty in recruiting consultants with several posts receiving no applicants.

While under questions from the Oireachtas, Minister Reilly downplayed the recruitment problems and stated "there is not the great crisis chaos that the Irish Hospital Consultants Association would like to paint".

Two days following this the Minister stated "it was never my intention that somebody who has spent 10 years working as a cardiologist...would be expected to return here and commence work at the starting point on the salary scale, that, clearly, does not make sense".

He was appointed as party spokesperson on Health in 2007 and promoted to Deputy Leader in a reshuffle on 1 July 2010.

He has worked as a GP in the North County Dublin area for the past 25 years, with surgeries formerly in Lusk and Donabate.

Reilly currently has a surgery in Lusk.

For his first official trip as Health Minister, Reilly embarked on an expedition to China.

His second official trip was for a meeting on non-communicable diseases in New York City from 17 to 20 September 2011.

He conceded for the first time on 17 January 2012 that budget cuts he was implementing would affect frontline health services.

His predecessor, Mary Coughlan, referred to the number of patients on trolleys as a "national emergency".

Shortly before becoming Minister for Health the number of patients on trolleys reached a new record high of 569.

On taking office, James Reilly vowed that "never again" would we see 569 patients on trolleys.

The number of patients waiting on trolleys dipped for a time following his appointment as Minister for Health, but grew again before he left office.

In July 2012, Reilly was named on a debt defaulters' list as owing a debt of €1.9 million together with four others on foot of a judgment which had been registered in the High Court.

The dispute was eventually settled with the nursing home at the centre of the dispute sold.

Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin tabled a motion of no confidence in Reilly on 3 September 2012 after more cuts in the health service.

He says the search for savings would focus on tackling "inefficiencies and waste", such as excessive sick leave and overtime.

The Labour junior minister Róisín Shortall addressed the Dáil during this motion and did not indicate her support for him or mention his name once, though she did not vote against the motion.

Reilly won the vote of no confidence by 99 to 49.

On 26 September 2012, Shortall resigned as Minister of State for Primary Care and her party whip, citing lack of support and the lack of an explanation from Reilly as to what criteria were used to select an extra 15 sites for primary care centres, including the placement of two such centres in Reilly's own constituency.

Just two weeks after the motion of no confidence, Reilly unilaterally cut Irish consultants salary.

Reilly instructed his department to start collating an outpatient waiting list for the first time, which, when it was first published in March 2013 showed over 100,000 patients waiting over a year.

Thousands of them were waiting over four years.

By December 2013, this waiting list had been reduced by 95 percent.

The number of patients waiting over 8 months for an inpatient or daycase procedure has now been reduced by 99%.

Reilly was moved to the position of Minister for Children and Youth Affairs in a cabinet reshuffle in July 2014.

He retained responsibility for Public Health and anti-smoking policy.

In this role he faced controversy over the Catholic church's constitutional right to give preference in admission at church controlled schools to baptized Catholic children.

Virtually all of Ireland's state-funded primary schools (97%) are under church control.

Irish law allows schools under church control to consider religion the main factor in admissions.

Oversubscribed schools often choose to admit Catholics over non-Catholics, a situation that has created difficulty for non-Catholic families.

The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child in Geneva asked Reilly to explain the continuation of preferential access to state-funded schools on the basis of religion.

He previously served as Acting Minister for Children and Youth Affairs from February to May 2016, Minister for Health from March 2011 to July 2014 and deputy leader of Fine Gael from 2010 to 2017.

He subsequently announced his retirement from politics after he lost his bid for election for his old seat at the 2020 general election.