Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

The record will show it.

The point I want to make is that it was the Minister for Health and Children, with the support of the Government side, that brought about the changes that have resulted in real improvements for people with cancer care requirements, particularly those with breast cancer. This has been confirmed in recent weeks by a HIQA report. The support for the reform and change in facing up to the issue was not uniform in the House at the time in question.

Rather that criticising the Minister for being reactive, one should acknowledge she has been most proactive in trying to bring forward reforms in the health sector that are necessary and politically difficult and which do not always win support. When we see systems failures and difficulties in the health service, Members are quick to question in the House what is happening and the nature of the accountability mechanisms, and rightly so, but when people are involved in the reform of the health service and doing what is necessary to bring about better standards and greater cross-assessment and put clinical teams in place, there is very seldom the same uniformity of opinion.

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