Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy. Before we can say when the report will come back, we need to have the terms of reference. The terms of reference will determine the extent of the work that has to be done. I want to be sure that we incorporate what there is to be learned from retired Mr. Justice Frank Clarke's report. The process is that the report comes into the chief executive and I will have view of the report. When I have read the report, I will make sure that the terms of reference incorporate whatever needs to be incorporated. At that point, we will be able to give a timeline. Even if the report comes back and says there needs to be a new model 3 hospital and it needs to have an ED, and even if the next Government says we are committed to building that, it will take years to get from here to there. What I care about the most is the people who are on trolleys in UHL right now while we sit here. It is not acceptable. The overcrowding there must be dealt with. Yes, we will have the review and it will be up to this Government or the next Government to decide what to do with that review. The review may come back and say there is no case for a second ED. We do not know. We must stay focused on the reforms and the capacity that we are putting in place now to make sure that the number of patients on trolleys stops going up - it has started to come down in the past few weeks - and that it continues to fall. That is absolutely key. We need to get the 70 beds opened. We have got access to them and they are going to make an immediate difference. We need the 16 beds on-site and the 96-bed block open. We need the GP on the door and the MAUs moving to 24-7. We need a strong patient flow team and we need to continue with the progress that has been made in terms of senior decision-makers being on-site. We need to continue with the progress that Sandra Broderick, the clinicians and others are making in terms of driving down delayed transfer of care and increasing weekend discharge, which they are. What is going to solve this problem in the shorter term is capacity and reform, while we do the HIQA review.