Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick East, Labour)

It did not get them when they were promised. Again, we are offered more consultants but it is always in the future. However, they are not in place, so how are we supposed to believe the Minister?

The crowd that turned out in Nenagh knew the issues very well. They know we need a major specialist centre. I have no problem with the Minister's plan and agree that people with severe trauma due to, for example, road traffic accidents, no matter where in the region they come from, should be stabilised at the side of the road and taken to the Mid-Western Regional Hospital in Limerick. That is true and I have no problem with it. However, that is only a tiny minority of patients who use the hospital services in the mid-west. People feel very strongly, and I agree with them, that hospitals the size of Nenagh, Ennis or St. John's have much to contribute to people with more common conditions, who need surgical procedures closer to home or who need a more straightforward access to their hospital than they can get through the channel of the accident and emergency unit in the Mid-Western Regional Hospital. Those people are also stakeholders and are entitled to be involved in the debate. That is why my colleague, Senator Kelly, and I published the Teamwork report when we received it. We had planned to publish it, as the Minister knows, on a Monday when we released our press release. The HSE and the Minister rushed to publish it so they could have——

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