Ms Claire Mahon:

Just briefly, the RN forecast was mentioned. It is clear from page 4 of the document provided to the committee that there is a wealth of international information which proves the benefits of higher ratio of nurse to patient. I would like to relate this to the patient at the bedside. We all have to think of how we want to be cared for. Do we want to be cared for by somebody who is overworked, stressed, over-burdened, anxious, upset and distressed or by professionals who know what they are doing and are working in a diverse skill mix? We do that every day of the week but in a trained skill mix that has the knowledge and is regulated when it comes to our nursing graduates and qualified nursing staff. To put an ill-qualified nurse in a situation where she feels unsafe does harm to patients, not just to the nurse. We are being forced to do that. We all have to think seriously about the social dynamic of how we want to be cared for across all our care environments because currently they are not safe. We have said this previously. We appeared before the committee in November 2012 and presented a staffing survey, carried out by an independent person, Dr. Keith Hurst, from the UK, which showed we had on average six fewer staff per shift in Irish hospitals wards than in the UK. We have been saying this for a long time. None of us wants to look back in ten or 15 years to see reports like Mid-Staffordshire being fired at us, to say that we did nothing. That is why we are here.