Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

There are a number of questions there from Deputy Donnelly. First, and I see him regularly making this point, I am not building private health facilities. I am building rooms under the current rules that Fianna Fáil was happy with in government, which allow those rooms to be used for private facilities. The Deputy talks about the consultants a lot. I would like him to go and talk to them about the use of those rooms because they would point out that they have a contractual right today to do private practice in public hospitals. Unless the Deputy wants our doctors not to turn up at work, under their current contract they have a right to use those rooms. I want to change those rooms. I want them to be public rooms. I do not want any private practice in public hospitals. I would welcome Fianna Fáil's position on that. I see on the Fianna Fáil website that it commits to the de Buitléir report on removing private practice from public hospitals. The Deputy should say that. It would be very helpful. If Fianna Fáil is in favour of removing private practice from public hospitals, we agree with this and we should get on and do it together.

On the beds argument, we will have this another day, probably in some television studio during some election, I hope in May 2020. The number of day case beds might have risen but the number of inpatient beds fell at a time of economic growth in our country, and that is very regrettable. I look forward to debating that point.

Access to the health service has not collapsed. There is an absolutely serious issue with outpatients and a lot of the criticisms the Deputy makes regarding outpatients are valid. I accept them. We must do a hell of a lot better in relation to outpatients. However, with inpatients it has dramatically improved. The number of people waiting for hospital operations has improved. Access to primary care, including the fact that we have expanded eligibility for free GP care, has improved. I hope in the budget to expand access for more children to free GP care and to dental care. That access is improving. The fact that there are 100 more therapists means that access is improving. If the criticism was of outpatients, I would take it and I should be held to account, but in general access has not collapsed.