Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am only asking one question because this is at the core of the whole problem. There is this view that we need more stuff. We need more acute beds, doctors, nurses and maybe we do and maybe we do not but the reality is that per age-adjusted population, we already have more of all of this stuff than countries who do not have our waiting lists so they clearly are doing something better than we are with the assets they have that we are not doing. So what I absolutely am challenging is what is quite a lazy view and I am not pointing Mr. Bolger out. Groupthink has settled in to the effect that we have people dying on waiting lists and have young boys and girls whose spines are curving because we do not seem capable of getting to them quickly enough. The answer is that we need more stuff and the NTPF, which Fianna Fáil supports and pushed for, is a sticking plaster, not a structural change. Given that this new unit has been set up, it is great Mr. Bolger and his team are working on this, I am trying to force the thinking a little here. It is just not enough to say more is needed if other countries do not have the waiting lists we do with broadly the same assets. Beyond saying that we need more beds, doctors and capacity, what are we not doing that other countries clearly are because they are solving the problem with a similar level of assets to what we have?