Martin Ferris (Kerry North, Sinn Fein)

At her party conference at the weekend the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney, and her colleagues were fond of quoting figures to prove how beneficial they had been to the country over their years in Government. One set of statistics conspicuously absent from any of the self-congratulatory speeches was that found on the Irish Nurses Organisation's website showing the numbers of people each day on trolleys in the hospitals under the Tánaiste's responsibility. This happens when we are living through a period of unprecedented wealth. Despite that wealth, there has been no improvement in the health service, especially in the past ten years. In fact, many would argue it has gone from bad to worse.

Yesterday 331 patients spent the day, for many not the first, on trolleys because no beds were available. In my town of Tralee, in Kerry General Hospital there were ten people on trolleys. Whether this is coincidental, on 8 November last I was asked to leave this House because I raised the conditions in the accident and emergency unit in Kerry General Hospital. Nothing has been done in the succeeding six months to improve that situation. Last weekend 17 people, including four on the permanent casualty beds and others sitting on chairs, awaited treatment in the accident and emergency unit in Tralee.

When I was in Kerry General Hospital a few weeks ago one man with a broken leg had been there for about six hours waiting to get treatment. On another occasion when I was there, in November last, a 74 year old woman had spent the entire previous night and that day awaiting treatment in the corridor and some of that time she spent sitting on a chair. Such cases continue to arise. This is not the fault of the hospital staff, who are attempting to work under extreme and difficult conditions without proper staffing levels or facilities to cope with the demand.

There is also the ongoing situation where cleaning is being inadequately performed owing to lack of staff and materials. I stated at the time Kerry was given a poor rating in the report on hospital hygiene that it was simply impossible for the staff to do a proper job and, in some cases, nurses were having to perform the work of cleaning staff.

The seriousness of the situation cannot be emphasised enough. Everybody who has spoken during this debate has alluded to the fact that despite the massive resources that are supposedly going into the health service, it is inadequate and needs to be rectified.

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