Olwyn Enright (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael)

I wish to share time with Deputy Joe McHugh.

It was a mistake that shouldn't have happened even once. And now I can't believe that here has been yet another botched cancer test in our health system.

These are not my words but those of Rebecca O'Malley, which were published on 8 August 2007. I wonder how she feels today knowing that it is no longer one mistake or two but several mistakes in several hospitals affecting several women. One could be put down to human error; at this point, crises seem endemic in our system. When one reads her words and meetsthose affected by the latest scandal in my constituency, it brings it home that these are real women with real families who placed their trust in the health system and were let down andfailed utterly. This is the central point and nothing we do in the future will change this reality for them.

Due to a failure by the Government to get any sort of handle on the health service, 3,026 women who had been through the Portlaoise centre in a four-year period had to wait by a ticking clock while a review was carried out. Now eight women have received the worst possible news, six more must get further checks and 13 still await confirmation while the clock is still ticking. Early diagnosis was stolen from these women.

I reiterate a clear fact in this case. This Government chose the Midlands Regional Hospital in Portlaoise as a designated centre for breast cancer care for the midlands area in 2000. However, the follow-through on this designation, in terms of adequately funding that supposed commitment, providing the most up-to-date equipment for a designated centre and ensuring enough staff were available to take mammograms, read results and check them, never happened.

In October 2005, the Minister for Health and Children personally made a commitment at a press conference in Emo that the cancer unit would be up and running within the next 12 months, with interviews taking place to find staff. It is easy to make a designation and the Government did that but then it effectively walked away. What confidence can we have that its attitude to the newest forms of designation, the centres of excellence, will be any different?

The Minister outlined today that she first became aware of problems at the Midlands Regional Hospital in July 2005 when she was told that the radiological service was being provided by people who had no expertise. Yet, apart from passing the issue around for examination, nothing seemed to change. There seems to be some contradiction which I ask the Minister to clarify in respect of her speech. She said the hospital had one permanent consultant appointed in June 2004. She then said that in the summer of 2005, breast radiology services were being provided by two locum radiologists. What happened to the permanent one appointed in June 2004? One permanent post was then filled in August 2005.

I am also concerned by the delay between advertising posts, holding interviews and making job offers and the fact that the person offered the position is allowed such a long period of time in which to turn it down. I ask the Minister to respond to this point and to address the question of why it is so difficult to recruit staff to the Midlands Regional Hospital. Thousands of people are moving into the area. People are commuting from there to Dublin and elsewhere, yet it seems to have been a particular problem to get staff for the hospital there, which is a reflection on the entire issue.

What response was given to the radiology department when it expressed concern about the age of the mammography machine and advised that a digital machine was needed? The HSE said a routine inspection on 18 May indicated that the machine was satisfactory. We are told that it was operating correctly. However, the complaint was not about it operating incorrectly. It was about it not being up to the job and the need for a digital system, rather than a film system. Was any inspection carried out in the intervening five months? They were warned, in black and white, about the possibility of delayed or wrong diagnoses. How much clearer did it need to be? Did this, together with the earlier warning to the Minister, not at least spark any little ember of concern or suggestion that maybe we need to look a little bit closer at this issue? I do not know whether the machine was at fault but it is clear that staff had legitimate concerns.

Professor Drumm's job is to implement the policy laid down by the Government, or so we were told when he was appointed. He blamed this crisis on "an inherited fragmented system of care". It is time to get a grip on the facts. Practically the only difference is that the actual health boards were abolished. At the time the health boards in the midlands were dominated by Fianna Fáil. As far as I can see, since the creation of the HSE, the same people are in the same jobs but with fancier titles, in mostly the same places, being presided over by the same Government. Nothing has changed.

Some people have questioned the commitment of Fine Gael to centres of excellence. I make no apologies for raising questions. Deputy Enda Kenny read out a letter where the Minister, Deputy Micheál Martin, then Minister for Health and Children, clearly outlined what the Government committed to Portlaoise on designating it as the midlands centre for breast care. Key components of that promise were reneged upon. The Government did not honour its promise to the women of Laois-Offaly so for me to accept, on blind faith, these new commitments by the same Government without question would be a total failure on my part to represent the women and men who put me here to hold this Government to account. The Minister must show me where the money will come from to build these centres, prove that she has the right numbers of qualified staff ready, show me where those women who need examination and treatment in the meantime will go, prove that this will not further delay them getting appointments, give me start and end dates for each centre and prove to me that transport will be provided. If she does, there will be no buts.

I was sickened listening to the Taoiseach reply to questions today. He seems to take umbrage at answering questions on this issue. He has attempted to wave the problem away. According to him, he gave the HSE the money and it is up to the HSE to decide what to do with it. That will not help these women who have had a dangerous disease fester in their bodies after being told they were not sick. He told the House that the Government is "doing a top class job for those women". He stated: "While I feel sorry for people and I will work might and main to try to improve the position, I reject the position whereby Deputy Gilmore can come into the House and castigate a health service which we put in place and which is a good one." What frightens me is that he is so far out of touch with reality that he believes it and does not realise it is not a good idea. I have seen many failures of accountability in this House but today has taken it to a new level and a new low.

I accept that the Minister has apologised but the system is not working. It failed the women of the midlands, women in Cork, Susie Long and Rebecca O'Malley. How many more names will be on the list before someone in government has the courage to realise that there is more to the job of government than making announcements, that it is about follow through, responsibility and accountability above all?

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