Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)

The implementation of many recommendations of the task force is already under way. Many concern capacity in various hospitals. These began during the gestation period of the task force report. Overcrowding is something of a jigsaw. We need more consultants on duty in hospitals, more access to diagnostics and more measures taking place at community level. All of these make an impact on accident and emergency units. Until relatively recently, there was one hospital on call in one part of the city and one hospital in the other. Now, we have accident and emergency units everywhere.

In those years they were for genuine accidents and emergencies. Today our accident and emergency departments are dealing with people who have chronic illness because it is not being appropriately managed in the community or with people who need diagnostic care because they are waiting so long. That is why, in time, the other measures that have been put in place by the HSE will have a significant impact. When I had a long meeting last week with Professor Drumm — whom I had not met since prior to the general election being called — he informed me of a number of initiatives that had been put in place by the HSE in the intervening weeks to help hospitals to achieve the kind of targets we are talking about.

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