John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)

The Government got away with it at the previous general election but I do not believe it can pull off the same trick twice. The Tánaiste's predecessors in office as Minister were Deputy Cowen, who kept his head down and described the Department as Angola, so full of landmines was it, and Deputy Martin, who was really the Minister for reports and who published document after document about the health service. He even established a commission on water fluoridation, which was a ridiculous exercise that cost a lot of money. All he needed to do was ask me and I could have told him about water fluoridation without costing him or the taxpayer a penny.

The Tánaiste took office like a sheriff coming into town on a horse. She was going to clean up the Department of Health and Children and take no nonsense. The Tánaiste, like the Taoiseach, stated in this Chamber that she would deliver a world class health service. I said at the time: "Dream on". The Tánaiste took umbrage at my comment but we are still far away from a world class health service. Instead of delivering such a service, the Tánaiste has begun to indulge in the blame game. She is dumping on the doctors and nurses who are apparently to blame for the crisis in accident and emergency. These are the staff on the front line who have contributed more to our health service than the Tánaiste ever has or will.

The Tánaiste has overseen the introduction of the Health Service Executive. My amendment to the Government motion states that the HSE has resulted in less accountability and transparency. Professor Brendan Drumm has effectively become a ventriloquist's dummy. The Tánaiste is spinning a line which Professor Drumm takes up to propagate the same message, which is that lack of bed capacity is not the problem.

Some figures will help to encapsulate the problem. We have experienced a 25% increase in population since the 1980s but in that period there has been a 25% reduction in bed capacity. It does not take a rocket scientist to work out that there is a problem in this regard but, apparently, the Tánaiste has not worked it out yet.

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