Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Okay, we will ask specifically for that where there might be parts of the metropolitan area not covered by the metropolitan area plan where there are obvious gaps in it.

For people who will read this document when we publish it, I want to highlight the reason Eir gave for withdrawing. That is in this document. The rationale for the State purchase of a €200 million stake in Enet is there. It continues to deal with the broadband plan. We will come back to that because it keeps referring to high-speed broadband. We have asked it to define what it means by that. It refers to download speeds of 30 Mbps and upload speeds of 6 Mbps. That is not high-speed broadband. High-speed broadband is the biggest misnomer of all time. That is not high-speed broadband by anybody's definition in this century. If those figures are mentioned in any of the contract details, we are not getting what it says on the tin. Before we finish with that we need specific data. It has to be future-proofed. If those types of references are in the contract, it is a waste of space before we start. There should be no investment in broadband that is delivering 6 Mbps of upload speed. That is a waste of money in this day and age. If that is what the plan entails, we will need to discuss that in more detail. We will be talking to a number of private operators here as set out in our work programme. We have quite a bit to come back to on that. For the moment, the letter contains interesting information and we are noting and publishing that.

No. 1797 from the HSE provides information as requested by the committee on the national ambulance service. Deputy Lahart had requested information on this. I propose we publish this and forward a copy of this to the Deputy.

Next is further correspondence from the HSE providing information on the development of national screening guidelines for hepatitis C; the reviews that have been undertaken in Portiuncula Hospital and the Portlaoise maternity hospital; issues relating to miscarriage diagnosis; and an update on the changes being made in clinical assessment. We asked for this in the context of medical negligence issues. We also asked for a note on the project team established to examine local reviews. We asked for a note on the plan to enhance learning from incidents.

I wish to make a few comments on aspects of concern. On page 4, the HSE confirms: "Doctors may require retraining as part of the outcome of a disciplinary hearing, investigation of an incident or following a legal settlement with or without admission of liability." The idea that they may require training is not good enough if there is a major incident. It should be almost mandatory. We will come back to that.

On the current practice of local reviews of an issue that arises in a particular hospital, at the bottom of page 5, it is stated: "At a local level, once a review has been completed, learning is expected to be shared across the service...". That is harmless. If that is the policy, we expect something might happen. The final page refers to the plan to enhance learning from incidents. That is what we want. We want the HSE to learn to reduce future incidents. The letter states:

Though the current practice outlined above remains valid, the HSE has identified that there are also a number of other ways in which learning can be captured...

The second project is focused on putting in place a system whereby ‘lessons learned’ from incident reviews can be provided to a single point within the organisation.

We are hearing that the HSE does not have a single point where lessons from medical incidents can be learned and it is now developing a project to centralise the lessons to be learned. It is decades behind what is acceptable. That will be the recommendation when we come to issue a recommendation on that; it is so obvious. It is dreadful that it is saying that.