Maurice Quinlivan (Limerick City, Sinn Fein)

Yes, I am asking if it can be treated as priority. Do we tell people in Limerick that they have to wait another four years for the 96-bed unit? The one that opened recently has, in fairness, made an impact. However, despite the impact it is made, we are still leaving 50 to 60 people on trolleys every day. It is not acceptable. We have been abandoned in the mid-west for so long. While I welcome the report very much and the three recommendations in it, as one of my colleagues said, nobody needed HIQA to do the report, we all knew this. We are not experts but everybody knew the issue in UHL. The staff do a great job, as I said. It is the number of people who present to the emergency department. It is the huge catchment area of over 400,000 people and we have no other hospital supporting it in the way, for instance, there is in the south east. I appeal to the Government, and I know HIQA cannot answer for it, to cut through whatever can done and to do this as fast as possible. It needs to treat this as the emergency it is.