Marie Sherlock
Dublin Central · Labour Party · Ireland
“That is why I want to see our local authorities moving from being just bystanders that license waste collection companies to actually controlling how the service is delivered.”
“That is why I want to pay tribute to all the people who are here today, including Stoneybatter Pride of Place, Phibsboro Village Tidy Towns and all the people working within their communities to keep them clean.”
“Panda’s parent company, Beauparc, sold for €1.3 billion in 2021 to an Australian investment firm. It is also co-owned by a US private equity firm. They are not in Ireland for the good of their health. They are here because they know they can make serious money. We know Greyhound’s parent company is registered on the Isle of Man.”
“The other important thing to say is that we did not hear any new ideas today, and I say that with the greatest respect to the Minister of State. We did not hear any ideas with regard to the profound challenges we have regarding our plateauing recycling rates and all the other issues that are there. That is disappointing.”
“I pay tribute to a lot of the work that many officials and workers in Dublin City Council do because, in some ways, their hands are tied behind their back. They recognise the issue with regard to landlord responsibility. I am very disappointed to hear the Minister of State's comments about landlord responsibility.”
“Dublin City Council was able to negotiate for the installation of ten-tonne compactors in the commercial areas, yet when it came to the residential areas, I understand the council tried to negotiate with the bin collectors on the roll-out of shared collection systems, but to no avail. That pretty much sums up our dysfunctional system.”
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“It is important to note that that took a long time and the leadership of a small number of fierce parents. But for their tenacity and persistence - I am thinking of Anne Phelan and others - we would not have that school today. Cabra Community College, which is a different type of school, also came out of a grassroots campaign in 2019, of which I was part. This was a small number of parents who were utterly dismayed at the lack of co-educational secondary school offerings within Dublin 7. They wanted a co-educational school that was also multidenominational, if possible. Cabra Community College had a very long and proud tradition in Cabra but had very small numbers. We ultimately saw this school transformed into the school it is today.”
“Before I talk to the frustrations, and the motion presents the frustrations felt by many parents very well, it is important to state that there has been some progress in some parts of the country, particularly in my constituency of Dublin Central where, in recent years, two new Educate Together schools were established on the border between Dublin North-West and Dublin Central, Grace Park Educate Together National School and Dublin 7 Educate Together National School. We have a new Gaelscoil, Scoil Áine, under the patronage of An Foras Pátrúnachta. We have a ground-breaking secondary school, a product of a collaboration between Educate Together and the education and training board, in Clonturk Community College, of which I was proud to be a board member.”
“I thank Deputy Cummins and the Social Democrats for bringing forward this important motion. They have a long track record in this area. From a Labour Party perspective, I wholeheartedly welcome this motion. It addresses an issue that was close to the heart of our former education spokesperson, Aodhán Ó Ríordáin, who very much championed it in a cold place when his was a lone voice calling for greater divestment of school patronage in this country.”
“Therefore, we need to hear very clear answers for the frustrated early years providers who applied for the scheme in the genuine hope they would be able to expand their early years services but who cannot do so because of the lack of action by the Department. The second key issue I want to raise this evening is governance. Some 99.9% of providers are brilliant and go above and beyond every single day in the work they do, but there are a few that exploit confusion among parents over fees and the freezing of the fee structure. Last August, we had the revelation that Hyde and Seek was one of a number of crèches found to be overcharging. What I want to understand is whether every parent has been fully refunded. There was fighting talk from the Department last August in this regard.”
“The work on those applications has been completed and they are now sitting on the Minister's desk waiting for approval. The reality with the building blocks scheme is that the money has to be spent by the end of December this year. Think about the logistics of this. It is now the start of May. If the answer were to be given tomorrow, it would take about six weeks or longer for the e-tenders process to be completed. Then we would be waiting another wee while for construction workers to come on site. Most early years providers are being told now by the builders that they try to line up in advance of the e-tenders process that there is not a snowball's hope in hell that the projects will be finished by December. The reason for this is, and the blame lies squarely with, the Department.”
“There was a time when EU structural funds were used to build crèches in Dublin 1 and other parts of the country but that does not happen anymore. For years now, we have been calling on the Government to provide direct State investment. This brings me to my first question, which is on the building blocks scheme. We campaigned for a long time for it to be introduced. To his credit, former Minister Roderic O'Gorman introduced it. In January of this year, a deadline was set for application by early years providers and they were told they would be notified in February. In April, they were told to be ready and that notification was going to come soon. It is now early May but there has still not been a dicky bird from the Department. We understand that Pobal brought in the OPW to assess the applications.”
“It often starts in the early weeks of pregnancy and goes on well past the child's first birthday. We have been running surveys in my constituency for the past two years and have noted some very stark results. Some 30% of parents tell us they wait for 18 months or more to access a childcare place. Over 20% of parents tell us they felt forced to leave their jobs. For all the talk of gender equality, it is mothers who bear the brunt of the lack of childcare spaces. While we very much welcome the conversation on reducing costs, that cannot be isolated from the need to expand greatly the number places. Particularly in Dublin's north inner city but also across the wider Dublin Central constituency, the key call from parents and indeed childcare providers and workers is for more spaces.”
“I thank Sinn Féin for tabling this important motion. It is a pity that the Minister is stepping out because I have some important questions for her, but no doubt the Minister of State, Deputy Naughton, will be able to take them up. There is considerable frustration among parents, early years workers and providers because, while this issue got an awful lot of attention in the run-up to the election, it has really fallen off the bandwagon since then. The hope of families, providers and early years workers that they will see genuine and substantive change in the early years space will not now be realised under the current Government. We await to be corrected on that. The reality is that, for far too many families, the shortage of childcare places is a stress.”
“Second, the Civil Legal Aid Act of 1995 still lists designated matters in respect of which legal aid may not be granted by the Legal Aid Board. The refusal to cover defamation seems to be based on a notion that suing for defamation is not only, but out to remain, the preserve of the well-to-do. Obviously, that is clearly a very outdated notion at this point. This attitude is completely at variance with the constitutional obligation of the State to vindicate the good name of the citizen. Given the constitutional status of the right of people to their good name, this exclusion is simply unjustifiable and we believe this restriction needs to be deleted. There are more than enough safeguards in the law to ensure that the Legal Aid Board does not fund frivolous or spurious actions.”
“A homeowner or a person who has assets of any type faces the very real prospect of an award of costs being followed up by adjudged mortgage or an order of sale. That is why the distinguished former president of the High Court pointed out that only millionaires and paupers can be found in our superior courts. I want to make two final and related comments about defamation and its cost. First, it is my understanding that it is still the case as a general rule, and without considering the complexity of any particular case, that legal fees in defamation actions are higher than the rate applicable to any other civil action. We should be using this opportunity to abolish any informal practice or standard within the practise of law that permits legal costs adjudicators to treat defamation as special and therefore permitting higher fees.”
“The current Minister, who was then a backbench TD, disagreed with his contention, arguing ordinary citizens can and do get access because of a no foal, no fee that operates to fund litigation. As the Minister knows, no foal, no fee is between a litigant and his or her lawyers. If the plaintiff does not win the case, the lawyers will not be paid. If a no foal, no fee agreement does not protect a litigant against the claims of the other side's lawyers, an enormous liability arises. That is why, as the Minister well knows, when a lay person goes into a solicitor's office and seeks advice about taking a defamation case or indeed many other types of cases, almost the first question that will be asked by a lawyer is "Do you own your own house?".”
“Since 1924, our courts Act has excluded defamation from the jurisdiction of the District Court. That means the simplest defamation action starts out with a value of at least €15,000. We ask the Minister to consider moving minor defamation cases to the lower court where lower damages will be awarded. If that does not prove to be the case, we will table an amendment to that effect on Report Stage. ISME and retailers have also raised concerns that defamation cases can be used to inflict costs on a defendant. Will the Minister address them in his comments? On Second Stage, my former party colleague, Brendan Howlin, the justice spokesperson for our party at the time, quoted a former president of the High Court, who said that in this country you have to be "a pauper or a millionaire" to pursue legal proceedings.”
“We express some surprise that we have not seen an amendment from the Minister to this Bill. On Second Stage, he told the Dáil, "I share many of the concerns being expressed by other Deputies. The decision to abolish juries in the High Court would be short-sighted." He went on to say, "I am concerned that the reason to remove juries for the purpose of defamation actions has not been thought out." The obvious question is: has the Minister changed his mind? Why? Some may argue there is an element of departmental capture in what we have before us on Committee Stage. If the main reason to abolish juries in defamation cases is to make litigation less expensive, we must consider that one reason for the cost of defamation cases is that the law does not permit these cases to be brought in the cheapest available court.”
“Justice MacMenamin noted: The right to a good name, freedom of expression and public opinion are closely connected concepts, in which the concept of 'the views of right thinking people' are inherently part of the test. Juries are intended to reflect the views of the public. They [reflect] the public mind and public opinion in balancing the constitutional values embodied in statutory form. This 'public dimension' is of great relevance in measuring whether a publication is actually defamatory at all; if it is, whether there is a defence to it; and if a publication is found to be defamatory, the measure of damages. If defamation is about damage to the standing of a person in the community, who is better to decide? That is the question in front of us - is it a judge or a cross-section of the Irish people?”
“It is only three years old. It needs to be applied and its application assessed. It is important to note that the law as set out in the Higgins case is still the law. Nothing in this Bill attempts to change that law. It does not matter whether future cases are heard by a jury or a judge sitting alone - either way, there will still be four bands of awards set out by the Supreme Court. Those bands will continue to be applied. I do not see how the abolition of a jury will affect the level of damages awarded in future cases since they will continue to be awarded in a way set down by the binding decision of the Supreme Court. I wish to refer to another case in 2017, McDonagh v. Sunday Newspapers Ltd. Mr.”
“For the first time, the ruling in that case categorised general damage awards in defamation cases in four categories. The first and lowest applies to moderate defamation for awards of zero to €50,000. There is a second band for what could be termed medium damages, awarding €50,000 to €125,000, and a third category for serious defamatory material, from €125,000 to €199,000. At the top of the scale of awards in the case of the most egregious defamation are awards in excess of €200,000 made before the courts. The Supreme Court recognised that these awards must be seen as truly exceptional and there was very real damage to the individual's reputation, where the judgment was clearly tilted in favour of the vindication of a good name. We argue that the judgment in the Higgins case should be given more time to bed down.”
“Judicial guidelines had to be introduced to put some control on damages arising from personal injuries. The courts Act 1988 abolished juries for personal injuries. We were promised then that it would reduce excessive or disproportionate awards, significantly reduce delays and legal costs, reduce the length of hearings, provide greater clarity and certainty and would facilitate earlier settlement of cases. As we all know, it did nothing of the sort. Insurance premiums continued to soar for decades. Even with the introduction of the Personal Injuries Assessment Board, PIAB, we still did not see the necessary reforms. It was only when judicial guidelines were introduced that we began to see some changes in what was paid out. That is why the Supreme Court judgment in the Higgins case is groundbreaking and so important.”
“We all need to support our regional and national newspapers in this country. There was a campaign for an overhaul of the defamation laws, understandably, as newspaper editors saw at the time that the risks associated with defamation were having a disproportionate impact on their insurance premiums. However, we have serious concerns about key elements of this Bill. This Bill is based on the recommendations of the in-house review of the defamation Act 2009, published by the Department in March 2020. This took place two years before the Supreme Court judgment in March 2022 in the case of Higgins v. The Irish Aviation Authority where Mr. Justice John MacMenamin delivered the lead judgment. Our view in the Labour Party is the in-house review and the Bill are out of date. Some of us are familiar with conversations regarding personal injuries.”
“I move amendment No. 1: In page 6, between lines 19 and 20, to insert the following: “Role of jury in High Court defamation actions 4. (1) Subject to subsection (2) and notwithstanding section 94 of The Courts of Justice Act 1924, or any other provision made by or under any enactment or rule of law, where a defamation action is tried by the High Court sitting with a jury— (a) all questions of fact shall be tried by the jury, and (b) damages (if any) shall be assessed and awarded by the trial judge. (2) This section applies only to defamation actions that are instituted on or after the date of its coming into operation.”. I speak as a former media spokesperson for the Labour Party. I listened for a long time to the concerns of newspaper editors about the crippling cost of insurance in the operational costs of newspapers.”
“This is my final point. While we rightly focus on the many children with autism, there are other children with learning needs such as dyslexia. There is an inherent hostility within the Department of Education that we have seen for many years with regard to the opening of new reading classes in schools. That needs to change.”
“When children finally get into a school, we then see another example of how broken the system is with regard to the lack of SNAs. I am dealing with the school principals of two schools in Dublin 7 who were asked to take on two children with additional needs on the basis that they would get additional SNA support but they got no SNA support. They have been told there is a cap of 23,179 until the end of this year. The NCSE cannot do anything. The schools have been forced to put these children on rolling reduced school days over many weeks. That is simply wrong. While we rightly focus on the thousands of children with autism-----”
“She is four and facing into her third year of preschool but, again, she has no prospect of a school place. We have been pleading for years for a matching process whereby the NCSE would allocate children to an appropriate school place. It is not rocket science. The health system knows about these children, as does the education system, yet far too many parents must blindly apply and take up places that often are not appropriate. At a minimum, a central applications process for special classes and special schools must be rolled out across the country. The Dublin 15 pilot has worked brilliantly. Some 25 places were allocated in 13 schools in one day. We need to see that rolled out, but we understand there has been strong resistance within the Department of Education. That needs to change.”
“Far too many families have to go through the same nonsense every year of applying to 20 or 30 schools. One mother told me she applied to 40 schools over a three-year period to ensure her child could access the constitutional right to an education. Jasmine, who is mother to Lewis, is here this morning. Lewis will be seven this year. He has autism. His mother said she is looking forward to him making his first communion next year, yet he has no school place. She has had 40 refusals. Crystal is also here. Her son Charlie will turn six in August. He has nowhere to go this September. He started mainstream school and, as his mother said, it was the worst year of their lives. He is now in an ASD preschool class and he is thriving but he has nothing for September. I also think of Kyle Mae.”
“We have a large number of parents in the Gallery this morning who come from brilliant groups like the NIC Side by Side group, FUSS, the ICON FAACT group and Embrace Autism D9. Many of these are part of the Equality in Education in Dublin Central group. These groups were set up out of sheer desperation because of the lack of health and education services for children. They have provided a lifeline to many parents, who bear the scars and the exhaustion from a health system that fails far too many of their children. A total of 11,552 children in CDNTs across the country have been waiting more than a year for psychology appointments. A total of 10,476 children have been waiting more than a year for speech and language therapy. The list goes on. These children are being failed by the system and the education system is adding to their torture.”
“The reality is that three years ago the commissioning team in CHI put in a request for 382.8 whole-time equivalent staff and they believe they have got little or no response from the HSE or the Department of Health. In fact, in the words of one, they have never been so far behind in the staffing of a new hospital project. We need to make sure that that staffing is put in place next year because the public expect at the very least that the hospital will maintain existing services and will increase its services over time. We will see a reduction in services next winter to ensure that the transition can happen safely, and there are questions about all that, but the critical thing now is that the proper recruitment and funding for that are put in place in order that the public gets the children's hospital it deserves in 12 months' time.”
“May I just make two quick points, a Leas-Cheann Comhairle? First, with regard to the weight of expectation, the Minister raised earlier the 22 new theatres. They will be brilliant when they are up and running, but it will take years for them to open, from what I hear when I talk to the commissioning team in CHI. I think we have 15 theatres at the moment. There is a very serious question about the resourcing and staffing to make sure that the existing level of services across the three sites will be maintained when they move to the new hospital next Easter.”
“The Minister said earlier that scoliosis patients account for 1% of all patients across CHI, and there has been a huge amount of attention on scoliosis sufferers, but we have to look to the others. When I look at the wait times for some of the specialties, it is quite distressing to see the length of time some children are waiting, not for appointments but for actual surgery: paed ENT, 313 days; dental surgery, 305 days; developmental paediatrics, 322 days; neurology, 228 days; nephrology, 258 days; dermatology, 300 days; and orthopaedics, 319 days. We need to make sure our eye is not taken off the ball for those other patients in getting the procedures and surgeries they require because they too are very much suffering. The last thing I want to say relates to the children's hospital.”
“The surgery takes place in Crumlin, the specialists travel there from Temple Street and then the child has to be transported back to Temple Street. We have this issue therefore - I would like to get clarity from the Minister as to the extent to which that happens - of very vulnerable patients being ferried by ambulance between Temple Street and Crumlin, all because of an organisational dysfunction relating to consultants. That has to end and it needs to be cleared up, particularly because if a child has spina bifida or a shunt and if that shunt fails for whatever reason, we are talking about minutes in terms of being able to treat them. The thought of putting them into an ambulance unnecessarily beggars belief.”
“We have to be informed as to who precisely is getting appointments at those Saturday clinics and make sure that those with the worst curvatures get the care they need. When I asked one parent a number of weeks ago what is next if we do not get surgery here, she informed me that it would be palliative care. That is the reality. Children have already died. Others could die if they do not get this surgery. The third key issue for me relates to the care pathways that have been put in place. From talking to certain parents, I understand that such are the cultural and organisational difficulties, particularly in Temple Street but also in Crumlin, that there is an issue about the logistics of when a child undergoes a surgery.”
“As the Minister acknowledged, for many families, travelling abroad is not an option. I spoke to one family last week who told me that because of the oxygen system their child currently has, the aviation authority will not allow that child to even board a plane. Of course, travelling is not going to be an option for that family. We have to ensure that while putting short-term fixes in place, we build the necessary capacity. The second key issue is that we have seen the opening of Saturday clinics for scoliosis sufferers. Again, that is to be welcomed. When I talk to families, particularly those with children with spina bifida, however, they say they are not getting appointments for those clinics. Other children whose curvatures are far less severe may be getting those appointments.”
“I heard what the Minister said about Great Ormond Street Hospital, the Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital in New York, Cappagh hospital and Blackrock Clinic, and we all get the urgency of the situation for these children. I support what is happening but it does not sit easy with me, particularly because of the cost involved. We understand that €600,000 is the cost of relying on surgical services in Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital in New York. That does not sit easy with me. If a child needs surgery, however, then that is what we need to put in place because of the massive backlog. In the meantime, what is being done to build capacity here? I am seriously concerned that capacity is not being built fast enough and that there will be an over-reliance on services outside the country or within the private sector here.”
“Never in a million years did his mother want to go public about this matter but because her child has been on a waiting list for more than 14 months, he is now facing two surgeries. Daniel's mother was forced to go public because the surgeon could not offer a single date. This Friday, we will hopefully have progress and have a date for Daniel's surgery, but there is a critical issue here about how we have one child who is has been waiting for 14 months. We know there are approximately 132 patients waiting for surgery but that only 47 procedures are planned. We also know that another 40 children go on the surgical waiting list each month. My question to the Minister relates to how those care pathways are being dealt with over the short, medium and longer term.”
“If there is anything to come out of this debate, it is that whenever the report into the unnecessary hip operations is published, it needs to clearly show the number of surgeons involved, whether what was being done was systemic or whether it was just about the sins of just one individual and whether it was private activity that drove these surgeries? As previous speakers indicated, people's faith in CHI and in the individual hospitals very much rests on that. In recent weeks I have spoken to many of the families that are going through the agonising wait for scoliosis correction surgery. I previously spoke in the Dáil about Daniel Collins, a 14-year-old boy who lives in Tralee, County Kerry.”
“The fundamental question is when will we see the full completion of all those recommendations. When I look at them, I can see that they are exceptionally onerous. They demand organisation-wide review, reform and systemic change. The question is does the Minister believe the current board is capable of ensuring that the implementation of those recommendations will be completed. There is a second but related issue about whether having a separate board for CHI makes any sense at all when the HSE is now compelled to have a much greater organisational oversight of the activities of the three hospitals that make up CHI. I say all this because the use of unregulated springs is one matter but the potentially even greater scandal coming down the tracks relates to the unnecessary hip operations.”
“Section 12 of the Children's Health Act makes very clear that: Persons appointed to the Board shall be persons who have, in the opinion of the Minister, experience or expertise in matters connected to the functions of Children’s Health Ireland or to corporate governance and management generally. The care of the three children that prompted the HIQA report reflected the reality that both the systems within CHI and the board failed. Obviously, there are now clear questions about the capacity of the board to oversee and implement the very onerous recommendations that were put forward by HIQA and to oversee the transition to the new children's hospital. We know there are 19 recommendations to be implemented. I heard the Minister say that 90% are either complete or in progress.”
“I refer here to the failure by the board to institute proper and basic processes, the failure on the part of the board of management to deal with poor staff culture and the failure on the part of the Government and the HSE to make good on commitments to put in place resources in order that children get the care they need in a timely fashion. I come from the perspective that I usually want those in leadership positions to own their own failures, but I am not so sure about the current board of CHI. Five of the 11 members of the board have served since 2018, one has served since 2020 and there is just one clinician in that cohort. There have been appointments since the start of the new year. I very much welcome that, but we need to see serious changes on the board this year.”
“I very much welcome that we are having these statements. It is important to say that over the past number of weeks, I have spent a good deal of time talking to staff of CHI - doctors and nurses - and many of the parents of patients. As we all accept, every day brilliant work is done across the three sites in question. I know that as a parent who has had to use Temple Street hospital on a number of occasions in recent months and also as a public representative. However, that brilliant work is being overshadowed by the practices of a few and by the systemic failings we are seeing within CHI. The almost 4,000 staff of CHI obviously do not want to be in the eye of the storm. They want to get on with their work, but we have to make good. We have to resolve the systemic failures that exist.”
“We must use the resources of the State to ensure that workers, particularly those in low- and middle-income jobs, are supported in the short to medium term so that their wages do not fall over a cliff edge and while their employers are trying to find other markets that they are supported. We do not know whether these tariffs will be short or long term. We do not know what Trump’s true intentions are but what we do know is that the impact on workers and their living conditions can be smoothed over by the State through temporary supports in the here and now if the Government so chooses. Finally, I would ask that we move away from this all-or-nothing kind of diatribe that we have heard from certain members of the Government in recent days about an economy-wide wage subsidy scheme. Nobody is asking for that.”
“I was a young trade union official in 2009 and 2010 and had to go into unionised workplaces to look at the finances of companies that were facing very difficult situations. The memories are seared into my brain of the devastation on workers' faces when I had to talk to them about the dramatic drop in revenue, the possible pay cuts or, indeed, redundancies that were on the table. The damage of those job cuts and wage cuts on people's lives and skills was in this country for many years. It lasted for well over a decade. Compared with that awful time in Ireland when we went through recession and the level of our deficit was through the roof, our country is unrecognisable now.”
“It is unconscionable that we would ask workers to sign on the dole for the days they are not working, facing a cliff edge in terms of their wages when we have the firepower of the State to ensure that those wages are supported for a short period of time. We are not talking about anything long term. For a short period of time, the Government can ensure those workers around the country who are now worrying about how they will pay their mortgages or car loans or pay for the school tour for their child can be supported in the weeks and months to come while those other marketing supports and all the other supports from the State are put in place to help those firms redirect their trade to other countries.”
“It is very different for the pharmaceutical sector and we worry about it too but the impact for it will be over the medium to long term. We have yet to hear of the tariffs to be announced for that sector. For the sectors that are suffering now, the reality is that some of those are high margin while others are lower margin. Some have a high price elasticity of demand while others are much more immune to price changes. No one size fits all but we have to learn the lessons of the past. In particular, we must ensure that we allow firms the room to hold on to their staff while they try to divert to other markets. We have a short-term work scheme that is not fit for purpose.”
“As this is a trade war that none of us want but that we have to respond to, we need to be clear about a few things. I do not believe anybody in this House is calling for an economy-wide wage subsidy scheme as I heard the Taoiseach and some others suggest in recent days. To do so would be disproportionate and unnecessary, so we should not waste our time on a bogus debate about jobs supports or no jobs supports. What we clearly need are targeted wage subsidy supports for the worst-affected sectors. The reality is that a number of firms are almost solely focused on exporting, particularly to the US, and they need our help. They are found in the alcohol, dairy, car components and medical devices sectors and are facing the double whammy of the weak dollar and tariffs and the impact has been immediate.”
“The families cannot go face to face with the doctor and there is limited access for the media. This is not in the public interest. Some 20 years ago, the patients of Michael Neary fought tooth and nail to have the Medical Council inquiries in public. Covid obviously made the inquiries go online and it is not acceptable five years on that they are still behind closed doors. That needs to change.”
“When the Taoiseach was asked yesterday about a public inquiry into the practices at CHI, he appeared to rule that out. I believe jumping to that conclusion without considering the facts, the impact and the outcome is a mistake. Parent groups and patient advocates have for many years been calling for transparency and accountability. We have to be clear that there are many fine clinicians across Temple Street, Crumlin and Tallaght hospitals, but there are also serious concerns. Such is the depth of systemic dysfunction I believe a major inquiry is required. My question to the Taoiseach concerns one of those inquiries at the moment, which is the Medical Council inquiry into surgeon A. It is taking place behind closed doors. The doctor does not have to appear in person.”
“Crucially, we know the three CHI hospitals will have to scale back their theatre activity next winter to transition to the new hospital building. My question for the Minister for Health and the Taoiseach is this: will CHI be able to live up to its commitment to provide surgery within the four months? Will Daniel get the surgery? Crucially, why has the HSE not put anything with regard to scoliosis in the waiting plan for this year?”
“Yesterday, I spoke to Louise Collins in Tralee, County Kerry. She is mother to 14-year-old Daniel, who suffers from severe scoliosis and has 95% curvature to his spine. The Taoiseach might have been alerted to the article about the family in The Irish Times today. In the 14 months since Daniel was told he needed surgery, his surgeon in Crumlin has not been able to offer him a single date, not even a missed or potential date. That flies in the face of everything we have been told would be put in place for such children. I cannot square in my head how, in February of this year, when 132 scoliosis patients were waiting for surgery, there were only 47 planned procedures. Flying to London or New York will not be possible for all the children.”
“A report was sent by Children's Health Ireland to the HSE and the Department of Health in October 2023 but it is yet to receive a response. The public are expecting at the very least the same level of service, and indeed more services, when the new hospital opens next year. We need that staffing.”
“Almost 70,000 health workers will go on work-to-rule next Monday. The issue is not about pay or conditions but the intolerable staffing levels in our health service. Not every part of the health service is impacted, but where it is staff are at boiling point. What action is the Government going to take to avert the industrial dispute that will start on Monday? We have gross understaffing in parts of our mental health and disability services, particularly in the community. Within hospitals, the spend on agency has increased to €250 million this year. The cost has been increasing in recent years. Even our new national children's hospital, the jewel in the crown of the health service, is 382.8 whole-time equivalents short of what is required to maintain existing services when they move into the new building next year.”
“The reality is that the failure of our State to provide those healthcare supports to people to be cared for in their homes means we are failing children. That has to change. I thank the Minister for supporting our motion today, but we need real action, and we need it now. We cannot afford to wait because there are children and young adults in the Visitors Gallery and there are thousands across this country who are relying on this Government to ensure we have a proper healthcare support system to look after their family members in the home.”
“Time and again in the communities I represent in Dublin Central, we see the vicious cycle of disability or long-term illness and families in poverty with the inability to work or reduced capacity to earn. Time and again I see that when long-term illness visits a family, in particular lone parent families, it falls to the young person in that family to shoulder the burden of care. That is wrong. We need the State to be able to provide much greater supports. The reality is that young carers are living in some of the most disadvantaged households in our communities and that this is a greater issue in working class communities. When we combine disability, long-term illness and poverty, the impact on those children's lives is profound.”