The Irish Medical Organisation is calling on non-consultant hospital doctors not to apply for the new jobs as full consultants due to be advertised by the HSE tomorrow. The organisation has also written to doctors associations in other countries including Britain and the US asking them to make a similar request to their members.

Victims of disgraced obstetrician Michael Neary will meet Minister for Health Mary Harney today to discuss a multi-million euro compensation scheme. Up to 250 women had their wombs or ovaries unnecessarily removed by Neary at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda up to 1998.

Thousands of nurses and midwives are to stage one-hour work stoppages outside six medical facilities today. Escalating their campaign for better pay and working hours, hospitals and psychiatric services in Sligo, Louth and Cork will be hit with the industrial action.

Nurses have announced details of further work stoppages for Tuesday and Wednesday of this week. Hospitals and mental health services in Sligo, Louth, Cork, Dublin, Laois, Offaly and Clare are being targeted.

Health should be the top priority for the new Ulster Assembly, a survey has revealed. According to the YouGov poll which questioned more than 2,000 people across the UK, health was voted the top spending priority for the next Executive, ahead of law and order, education, defence and the environment.

MPs probing human rights abuses should examine the unnecessary detention of over 100 people with learning disabilities in a Northern Ireland hospital, the DUP claimed today.

The number of racist crimes investigated by Gardai reportedly soared by around 50% last year. Reports this morning say the latest garda figures show 159 racist crimes were recorded in 2006, 63 of which involved physical assault.

A high Court judge has refused bail to a hairdresser accused of raping a 17-year-old male. Michael Joseph Diver (32) – described in court as ‘openly gay’ – is alleged to have sexually assaulted the youth in his flat in the Sackville Court area of Londonderry on March 18.

Fears that Cashel’s Social Welfare Office might close have prompted staff at the office to launch a petition on Main Street in the coming weeks. The news comes in the wake of Cashel Hospital’s closure earlier this year and has sparked widespread popular opposition, says Ellen Allison, who works in the Office.

Our Health Service faces a time of unpopular but necessary restructuring – some of which will be left to the new Assembly. Claire Regan reports on the task ahead for our new Health Minister and MLAs.