Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

I will be brief. The Minister stated there are many pieces to the jigsaw when dealing with the accident and emergency services problem. Does the Minister agree and acknowledge that the major problem is the availability of acute hospital beds and, as she noted in reply to an earlier question, that beds are being used inappropriately? Moreover, does she acknowledge that beds are being used inappropriately because of the Government's total failure to provide necessary step-down facilities? I refer to those people who have been through the worst of their illness, are not sufficiently well to return home and who need continuing care but who do not require acute hospital care. Does she accept that the Government has contributed to the national emergency that was created last year and that the problems in accident and emergency will not be resolved until it takes up its obligations to provide the requisite step-down facilities? Does she accept that these are the facilities that should be provided within those hospitals now designated for co-location and the construction of private hospitals?

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