Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

That is not a good enough answer after 11 years. What I understand the Taoiseach to conclude from the Portlaoise reports is that the problem was in Portlaoise and concerned the fact people there were not talking to each other, while the valiant efforts he and his Ministers were making to reform the health service were all resisted by people in this House and elsewhere. There is no mention, of course, of some of those behind him who were much to fore in this regard.

The Taoiseach is suffering from a bad dose of BSE — blame somebody else. That is his problem. For every problem with which he is confronted, he will find anybody to blame but Ministers in his Cabinet. The way he described Portlaoise — where people were not talking to each other, meeting or communicating — one would not bring a car to be serviced there if it was a garage he was describing.

After 11 years in office, this is the state of the health service he has presided over and which he is offering to the people. He is saying to the people that this is the service they are expected to accept. If they feel something is wrong with them and want to go for a test, they must go into institutions where people are not talking to each other, there is no communication, nobody knows what the other person is doing and nobody seems to be accountable to anybody else. That is not a functioning health service, it is a mess.

After 11 years, we need something more clear and definite from the Government than having it come to the House, shrugging this off and saying: "Well, we are going to make a fresh start." The Government has had ample opportunities to make a fresh start. It is no excuse to say that it was 2003, before the establishment of the HSE, as if somehow the Government is not responsible for what happened in 2003, when it had already been six or seven years in office and had already gone through two Ministers for Health and Children. The Taoiseach has presided over this monster, the HSE, which he created. This was his solution, which was going to solve the problem in the health service, but it has made it worse. All he can now do is plead that he wants to make a fresh start and spend another few million euros of taxpayers' money bringing in consultants to look at it again.

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