Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I wish to ask a question on the institutions that will be licensed under the legislation, an issue that I have raised before. What happens in the event that an institution adopts a policy of recruiting people who have a conscientious view of the legislation, resulting in the institution's having a diminished clinical capacity to carry out such medical procedures as may be required under the legislation? An institution may have a religious ethos or whatever, but there will be a certain view at senior management and board levels. The process of recruitment could be used to ensure the clinicians were of the same mind. That would diminish the capacity of the hospital to carry out such procedures, because it would not have clinicians available to carry them out. How could that situation be addressed in the Bill? We have talked about licensing 19 institutions and emergency departments in hospitals, and rightly so, in view of the fact that women who require terminations will often present at an emergency department. Suppose one has a tight group of like-minded very senior clinicians, comprising obstetricians, gynaecologists, anaesthetists and others? Their capacity could be diminished very quickly. My question is primarily on emergency department presentations as opposed to planned terminations due to a physical condition or on mental health grounds.