Séamus Healy (Tipperary South, Workers and Unemployed Action Group) | Oireachtas source

I welcome Dr. McLoughlin and the other officials, including Mr. O'Brien. I wish them well in their roles in the future.

I find it difficult to take this document seriously. It is completely at odds with what we see on the ground in our hospitals, home care services, community care services and mental health services. Page 2 of the document refers to the Department's values, service and the need to operate to the highest standards of professionalism. I do not believe the health services on the ground are being operated by the Health Service Executive, at management level or by the Department, to professional standards. I do not believe, for instance, that the wholesale closure of beds in wards throughout the hospital system meets professional standards. I do not believe that the overcrowding in our accident and emergency departments or the lack of respect for patients on trolleys in corridors in those departments means that.

On the point of fairness and respect, one would imagine that would mean respect for patients. In very many cases our patients are being backed up in accident and emergency departments on trolleys and in wards. On the other hand, there are major delays for various services and waiting lists. A lady contacted me yesterday whose child is an urgent case for ear, nose and throat treatment. That child will have to wait 18 months for the first out patient appointment.

On the reference to openness and consultation, I hope that means there will be openness and consultation in the future to ensure that the views of stakeholders, and in particular the perspectives of patients and other service users, are at the heart of the decision making process. That is not my experience of openness and consultation, either by the Department or the Health Service Executive. My experience of it is that the Health Service Executive and the Department make their decision and go through a consultation process that is a farce. I hope it will change in the future.

This document is at variance with what we see on the ground and also with the recent cutbacks announced, I am not sure by whom. I agree with Deputy Kelleher on that. We are not sure who is running the health services now, whether it is the HSE, the Secretary General or the Minister. Page 18 of the report regarding disability services refers to helping people with disabilities achieve their full potential, including living as independently as possible. Obviously, it believes the way to do that is to cut €10 million from the personal assistant budget. How anyone could come up with that proposal is beyond me and is at variance with that point.

The same page refers to services to enhance the quality of life of older people, maintain their full potential and support them in their homes and communities. Six hundred thousand home help hours were cut in the budget earlier this year. That is at variance with the document in terms of what is happening on the ground. I find it difficult to take it seriously.

The document refers to the cutting of funding by more than €2 billion between 2011 and 2014. That is not achievable if we want a reasonable and effective health service for patients. The officials must know that. Have they not thought of alternative methods of funding a proper health service? Why not ensure that very wealthy people pay their fair share of taxation and that taxation is put to work to fund a proper health service and not the difficult service patients find themselves tied up in now? It is the duty and responsibility of senior management in both the HSE and the Department to examine alternative methods of funding, particularly funding from very wealthy individuals who are not paying their fair share of taxation. A modest wealth tax-----