Breeda Moynihan-Cronin (Kerry South, Labour)

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. I am amazed at the amendment commending the Government. If anyone from the Government parties attended the public meeting referred to by Deputy McManus in Tralee two weeks ago, which I organised, they would have seen very little commendation for the Government. Hundreds of men and women attended the meeting. Some of them did not understand the issue prior to attending the meeting. However, when they learned about the apartheid-like practices in the area of women's health, they understood that people in the south west are again being treated differently from those on the east coast.

At the meeting, people whose lives have been affected by cancer, particularly breast cancer, spoke publicly about their frustration and outrage at the failure of this Government to extend BreastCheck to Kerry, Cork and the Munster region. What really annoyed them was the fact that the former Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Micheál Martin, had promised that the BreastCheck programme would be extended to the entire country by 2002. We now hear the scheme will only be extended in 2007 or 2008. However, people in Kerry are not prepared to wait any longer for the roll-out of BreastCheck and will mobilise because they have accepted this system from this Government for too long.

A woman who was born in Germany and who spoke at the meeting could not believe that she was denied access to a service simply because she chose to live in County Kerry. It is not only the people of Kerry, Cork and Limerick who are frustrated about the lack of action over BreastCheck. The PRO of BreastCheck is also exasperated with the Government's delay in sanctioning the roll-out of the programme to the rest of the country. He said recently:

We are ready to go but we need approval from the Department of Health and we have not got the go-ahead. Each week that we have no decision from Mary Harney, the later this will happen.

This statement puts the ball in the Government's court. I assure the Minister for State and all his Cabinet colleagues that we will pursue this matter until the extension of BreastCheck is delivered.

What is the Minister for Health and Children saying to the women of my county who rightly ask why they are being discriminated against because of where they live? What makes the lives of these women — and my life — less valuable than the lives of women on the east coast, including my colleague Deputy McManus? It would only cost €25 million to extend the scheme to the rest of the country, which is not a huge amount in the order of things. I ask the Government to take the opportunity tonight to announce the provision of the money to deliver the scheme to the rest of the country because the Minister will rue the day if it does not. Irish women now realise that a form of apartheid exists regarding access to health services and they will not tolerate it anymore.

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