Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the panel this afternoon. I suppose this is part 2 of our two-part engagement on this particular and vexed issue. I would like to ask a number of questions. I took a little note. My colleague, Deputy Kelleher, spoke about encouraging. I am more of the view, after last Thursday, that encouragement is not enough. That is my certain view, having listened to the Medical Protection Society and the State Claims Agency's contributions. I would like to ask the panel, but Mr. Boylan initially, a question.

The focus has to be on the patient. Doctors must admit avoidable errors that have resulted in some harm being done. I believe, and am more certain in that belief after last Thursday, that there needs to be a legal duty to inform the patient.

How would Mr. Boylan respond to the Medical Protection Society, MPS, and the State Claims Agency? What if it were the case that they were to proactively encourage disclosure? I am anxious to have this matter dealt with. "Encouragement" suggests a voluntary code. I am very much of the view that what has happened on the neighbouring island, and is applicable north of the Border, is what should happen here in terms of a legal duty of candour. We need to look at this as committee members and on a societal level. This is not about somebody we do not know - it is not always the other person. It could be you or me. It could be any of us at any point in our lives. We all have a requirement to use our health services. I would like to know that from the get-go until I am - hopefully - discharged, I will be treated openly and honestly and will be kept informed of all that takes place. I would like Mr. Boylan to address the issue of a voluntary code as against the legal duty of candour.

Many of the high-profile cases over the years have gotten significant coverage on television. Listening to Ms Courtney's contribution, for which I thank her, I recall situations in my own home over tea when the six o'clock news was reporting on different events, and my wife and family were commenting on how disgraceful it was that the State had actually sought to contest a case that was beyond question. We felt such disgust that this was being done in our collective name. I have no doubt that situation was replicated at family tables throughout the land. People have no wish for further hurt and pain to be brought to families who have already suffered so much.

How would the panel reflect on the Medical Protection Society's recommendations regarding the new statute of limitations of ten years for brain injury in children? I would be particularly interested to hear the response to this.

We watched and listened here last week and a number of comparisons were made between the situation here and in the neighbouring island. We are not comparing like with like. We have a very different health delivery system. At times, one wonders if it should be called a system at all. There is a national health service on the neighbouring island, which is a very different scenario. Would the panel like to offer a view on that? The MPS would have used statistics to suggest these were comparable situations but they are not. Furthermore, how would the panel respond to the MPS claim that we have seen a doubling of claims over a relatively short period?

I would like to take the opportunity on all our behalf to extend our very best wishes to Ms Courtney's daughter Bríd and to wish her every blessing in life. That there was no admission of liability and no apology is a very serious matter indeed. In many other collective cases, in terms of neglect through the years, a State apology has been hugely important. Members of this committee are more than conversant in that. It can be no different for an individual experience and a family's hurt. An apology and an admission are hugely important.

When discussing organisations that have appeared before the committee, particularly the MPS and the State Claims Agency last Thursday, it was observed that they have failed in their own stated intent - and I would place question mark over that intent - to deal with people's claims with integrity and honesty. There is scant evidence of that intent and the honesty factor certainly goes out the door when they are aware of the facts having been reported for their evaluation. If they are not proactive in encouraging that information to be shared with the individual patient, in my opinion as a layperson, they are then complicit in the withholding of critical information that could concern me, or any individual. As well as having neither integrity nor honesty, there is clearly no compassion whatsoever in their respective approaches. Go raibh maith agat.