Kate O'Connell (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Mr. Breslin, Mr. Reid and a few others were present at last week's meeting of the Committee of Public Accounts. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss primary care centres. I do not want to land the issue on them this morning but, in the context of Sláintecare, it is fundamental that we move things out of acute settings and into the primary care setting. There were 341 primary care centres planned from 2008 onwards. The matter was reviewed in 2012. It emerged at the meeting of the Committee of Public Accounts last week that no one has reviewed position of the centres in light of Sláintecare in order to see if they are fit for purpose in terms of what we want to deliver. There is no definition of what constitutes a primary care centre or a primary care team. While I am not completely hung up on that, if we are going to move towards treating defined populations, then, in the context of the connection between acute care and community care, it is imperative that the system that was embarked upon in 2008 is modified and made fit for purpose. If we are going to add diagnostic centres, we have to ensure that capacity exists among the 341 that are planned. Obviously, we cannot have 341 diagnostic centres but capacity must be there - dotted around the country - and it must be possible to add things so that we are not going to have to buy sites next to centres or whatever. When we are doing Sláintecare, it is about ensuring that we are not already tying a stone to our leg while we are doing it. We should be able to do it with the plans that are already there. We can modify them as we go. I was a bit concerned last week that it was almost as though the primary care thing was put on a shelf and left there and was operating separately from Sláintecare when it is integral to its success.