Ms Róisín Molloy:

In regard to Deputy Fleming's point about what will bring about closure for us, I do not believe that will ever happen. As in the case of raising children, whom as the saying goes never leave, for us the same applies in this regard. There must be a legal obligation of open disclosure, both for the organisation and the individual. The focus of current policy is on individual doctors and nurses. We believe the organisation as a whole needs to embrace that and to end the culture of blame in terms of who is at fault. There is also need for an audit of where we are at in terms of maternity services in Ireland, to include mandatory reporting of deaths of and injuries to babies.

On the issue of patient advocacy, the voice of patients is a good indicator of how well services are operating. Patients must be listened to and viewed as equal partners. We believe that patients need to be the masters of their own medicine and that when something goes wrong they can speak up and have what they say acknowledged.