Paudge Connolly (Cavan-Monaghan, Independent)

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this matter. We find ourselves speaking about Monaghan in controversial circumstances. I welcome the timely establishment of the eight-week investigation and hope it is completed in that timeframe by an independent individual with no ties to the north eastern health area. I welcome the early admission of the existence of three additional beds, however unpalatable it may be, and that the Walsh family referred to a productive meeting with the Tánaiste.

The terms of reference will concentrate on hands-on staff and direct care givers rather than the root causes of the problems, namely, the policy makers and the configuration of health and hospital services. We referred to health experts but is there any expert group that could ignore a letter signed by all consultant surgeons in Cavan and Monaghan requesting that Monaghan Hospital be allowed cater for acute surgical emergency? Such a letter was sent on 15 September, one month before the death of Patrick Joseph Walsh. The only additional resources these consultants sought was additional on-call theatre staff. Would any expert group not listen to service providers flagging problems? It beggars belief that they did not listen here.

I have further questions for these worldwide experts. Is it logical to take consultant surgeons from two hospital sites, place them in one hospital site and then request them to drive back daily to perform surgery in the original hospital? This is a waste of time, resources and money. Would any world authority consider it best practice to have six programme managers for acute hospital services in a five-year period, employed in an acting capacity and in charge of a multi-million euro budget? That has happened. In a ten-year period we have had seven Ministers with responsibility for health, from different parties in the House, in charge of a multi-million euro budget. Does that make sense? The lifetime of a Minister is something like 18 months and I do not know how anyone gets to grips with the brief in that period. There is a lack of consistency and if we saw the same happening with school heads, it would not last. Any private industry attempting the same would go bust immediately.

See this speech in context