Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chair. I am happy to substitute for Senator Black, who would have liked to be here.

The Minister talked about the antiquated building in Holles Street. The concern is that we are continuing with an antiquated approach to healthcare in that a private voluntary body would be delivering healthcare to women rather than there being national delivery of such healthcare. That is the wider frame of concern as to why it would be a private voluntary body rather than a national hospital delivering State public healthcare.

We turn then to the nature of the body concerned and the nature of the holding company. It is important to state that this is not a continuation of the national maternity hospital. The latter had 100 independent governors and it was not owned by one holding company in the same way. The Minister indicated that this new building will be owned by the State, but a new governance structure is also being put in place. In that context, there are real concerns, as people have said. We must move past the detail concerning whether services will be available.

I am going to ask two sets of questions. One set will be on those services and the other will focus on the land. Regarding the services, it is not just a question of whether services will be available.

Abortion was available in Ireland prior to the repeal of the eighth amendment but you had to be dying. How will those services be delivered? In what circumstances will they be delivered? Will it be in the rarest of circumstances? Will it be on demand? We have not had answers to these questions. No hospital in the St. Vincent's Healthcare Group is listed as an abortion provider by the HSE. That is on the record. It is a fact. In the past, hospitals in the St. Vincent's Healthcare Group were given guidance to only make sterilisation available to patients if the procedure were not to limit fertility, but as a by-product of another health issue. These are the nuances and details. Those concerns are extremely valid because in 2017 it said it would not gift or sell the land because it wanted to have integrated services and common protocols. Just a few weeks ago, yet again, it said the reason it will not sell the land is that it wants integrated patient care.

If this hospital operates under the same laws and delivers the same services set out by the State, what, then, are the differences in patient care that requires them to have control and input in the governance of the hospital? Is it around the protocols of when services are provided? Is it around how they are provided? Why is it telling us that it would not be able to work with the public maternity hospital? If it says it will not be able to work with the public maternity hospital, then why not? That is a core question on the delivery of services that needs to be answered. I would like to hear the Minister’s thoughts on that. I also have a follow-up question on ownership.