Martin Daly (Roscommon-Galway, Fianna Fail)
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I thank our witnesses for coming here this morning. Mr. Dempsey has laid out an interesting case. There is no doubt that it took significant political decision-making to centralise cancer services under the cancer strategy. A lot of capital was expended but it was repaid in heaps in better outcomes. Sometimes when we reform health services, we do not replace the services we remove with better quality services. In the cancer strategy, that happened and that is why there were better outcomes. I accept that.

One of the big questions is capacity. That is not just in the area of cancer; it is throughout the health services. We have had a growth in population of 1.2 million in the past 20 years and we have a projected growth of 100,000 a year going forward for the next 15 years, which is very significant growth in a very short period of time. We probably have the fastest-growing population in Europe. The question almost answers itself. Cancer is related to age, by and large. Of course, we get the terrible highlighted stories of younger people who get cancer, but the reality is that burden of cancer comes with older age. As one gets older, there is a higher risk. What type of investment are we talking about? Has the Irish Cancer Society done any analysis on that?