Paul Kehoe (Wexford, Fine Gael)

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this important Bill. We owe it to the citizens to provide them with an extremely good health service, which this Bill has the potential to do. However, it is up the drivers behind the Bill to ensure changes are made to improve the lives of everybody. Despite the Hanly report and the plans the former Minister, Deputy Martin, had for hospitals throughout the country, poor people are being left behind when it comes to health care. People are now waiting to get on waiting lists while those on waiting lists must wait three to four years for treatment.

An old lady with cataract problems came into my clinic two or three months ago. She had been waiting for an operation for the past two years and had a very genuine case. I pursued her case, made representations and we finally got her into hospital. However, when that poor lady got into hospital, it was too late and, as a result, she will have dysfunctional eyesight. She will be unable to look at television and read the newspapers because her operation was too late. If she had been seen perhaps four or five months earlier, it might have been a different story. If this Bill had been implemented a year ago, would this lady be in the same position? I believe she would be.

The Government talks about the great economy, the Celtic tiger and the boom years yet our health service has not got any better. We all know the amount of money pumped into the health service since 1997 when this Government first took office. It has spent millions of euros, which I do not deny. However, will the management structure proposed under this Bill protect the rights of citizens and will it be able to spend the money wisely as it has not been spent to date?

I have one major problem with the Health Service Executive. When I ask the Minister for Transport a question about the National Roads Authority — I use the NRA as an example because previous speakers mentioned it — he states that he has no direct responsibility. I hope the Tánaiste, or whoever is Minister for Health and Children in the next couple of years, will not state that he or she does not have day to day responsibility for the health service and that it is up to the Health Service Executive to make the call.

The chief executive of the South Eastern Health Board, Mr. Pat McLoughlin, has met Oireachtas Members from the south east twice a year. However, I will not have that same opportunity to meet the new Health Service Executive twice a year to discuss what is happening in the South Eastern Health Board area. That is not good for the health service.

In the late 1990s or early 2000, Wexford General Hospital was promised a 70-bed unit under the national development plan. Some 19 beds were to be fast tracked because they were needed as soon as possible. However, we are still waiting for those 19 beds. Will the chief executive of the new Health Service Executive be able to provide those 19 beds? I do not believe he or she will. That is the type of issue the Government will face in the next couple of years. Will this Health Bill deliver? I do not see it doing so. The Government has a great opportunity and has been making plans and it is up to it to deliver.

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