Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

We have professional people, namely, consultants, doctors and nurses, in our health service and most people's experience of it, once accessed, is good. The problem is that people are unable to access frontline services as a result of the cancellation or postponement of procedures and because appointments are not being made. One must go through a maze of bureaucracy in order to find out what is happening. The Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs, Deputy Ó Cuív, has rightly described the HSE as an impossible organisation.

Is the Government taking responsibility for the Health Service Executive? The Government created it and it is, as the Taoiseach tells us, spending a great deal of money on it. Is the Government responsible for the Health Service Executive? Does the Taoiseach agree with the HSE embargo on the recruitment of staff or will he at the very least direct it to recruit and replace frontline staff? If the Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs, Deputy Ó Cuív, is correct — I believe he is — what will the Government do to ensure the Health Service Executive delivers the type of health service for which it receives all of the money about which the Taoiseach keeps telling us?

See this speech in context