Peter Fitzpatrick (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the delegates. I will not repeat what I said in the first session. We are dealing with people's lives and with the closure of accident and emergency departments. I come from County Louth where the Louth county hospital in Dundalk was closed in 2010. This has resulted in ambulances travelling longer distances. Mr. Bell referred to the paramedics who are members of his trade union. He stated that his members are also committed to the bachelor of science degree programme in pre-hospital emergency medicine supported by UCD. Is this provided to all paramedical staff? He stated that the staff ceiling is 1,670. I do not think that is a small number but the HSE has stated that at the end of 2013 the ceiling was 1,692. There seems to be a difference in those figures. Both sides agree that the allocation for 2014 is an extra 43 staff.

Given that he is from County Louth, I have a few questions for Mr. Bell. There has been much criticism in County Louth of the ambulance service in Drogheda which has a catchment area of more than 80,000 people. The people in County Louth are looking for an improvement in response times. Are the response times different in County Louth from other areas? They are looking for an increased number of ambulances. Is there a shortage of ambulances in County Louth? They say they need more paramedical personnel. Is there a shortage? Is County Louth getting a fair share in the allocation of funding? They want a spare stand-by ambulance and they complain that the gardaí transported a patient to the hospital on New Year's Eve because no ambulance was on call. I ask for answers to those questions.