Mr. Michael Boylan:

Yes. We invited Dr. McDonald to a conference at the end of last year. It was startling to note the difference between the system in Illinois and the system here. They were like parallel universes. He explained that the University of Illinois had saved substantial amounts of money and pointed out that if patients are dealt with fairly, humanely and candidly, some would accept an explanation and apology and did not seek compensation, and seriously injured patients who needed financial help were much more reasonable to deal with. He described a case where a girl had died completely unnecessarily in the operating theatre and rather than suing, her parents donated all of her organs to the hospital as a result of an open, candid admission of liability and fault. These are the types of things that can happen if people co-operate rather than taking a head in the sand approach.

The suggestion of a ten-year or long-stop statute of limitation in all circumstances will lead to manifest injustice. As Mr. Cantillon stated, the parents of many seriously injured children will struggle with the burden of care and will have accepted explanations they were given at the time of the adverse incident. One of the individuals present has gone through this experience. The family of another patient who wanted to speak today would have been able to get through a ten-year statute of limitation by the skin of their teeth because they were misinformed at the time of birth about the circumstances of the birth and did not-----