Dan Neville (Limerick West, Fine Gael)

I thank the Ceann Comhairle for taking my question, but I am deeply disappointed that the Government is not in a position to reply. The Minister stated that he was not responsible and my question to the Government on the Central Mental Hospital at Thornton Hall has been ignored. Where does collective responsibility enter into it? I am surprised that the Minister of State, Deputy Moloney, is not present, since this is an issue for him. The Government has chosen to ignore what the Ceann Comhairle and I agreed was an issue arising from changes in the Thornton Hall project.

In transferring the Central Mental Hospital to a location adjacent to a prison, the Government is ignoring the human rights of people with mental illness. To locate a mental illness therapeutic facility beside a prison stigmatises and discriminates against its patients. Not only was the proposal roundly rejected by the Central Mental Hospital's families, carers and patients, the voluntary organisations, the Mental Health Commission, the hospital's clinical director and the Irish Human Rights Commission, it flies in the face of the core values and principles enshrined in the report on the mental health services, A Vision for Change, the recommendations of which have been accepted by the Government as policy.

Informing the Minister is pointless given the circumstances, but we were informed that a reason for moving the Central Mental Hospital from the lands in Dundrum was their value to the State. In changed circumstances, their value has been reduced considerably. For the reasons that I have outlined, the decision to locate the hospital beside a prison should be revisited.

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