Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I know that. This is my last question. The last question relates to the bombshell, as I described it in the Dáil yesterday, when the Minister came in. He was obviously not aware of the new information regarding the approximately 1,500 women who have not been audited.

For me and the public, it is incomprehensible that we had a national cancer control programme with its layers of management - whom I presume are all very good people - we have a process to compile and maintain a registry of national cancer statistics, and we have CervicalCheck. Even though we had layers of people, management, processes and pathways not one person over the years noticed that only half of the tests were being audited. Collectively, for our health system, how does that make the witnesses feel? It is absolutely mind-boggling that only half of tests have been audited since 2008. Frankly, that is just not good enough and it is wrong. There was panic in the Dáil Chamber last night as a result. I do not think it is credible to claim that nobody in the whole place knew about this. Somebody must have known. I am shocked by the fact that the matter was found out and then told inside in Dáil Éireann.