Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Independent)

The Deputy has asked a whole host of questions. A number of issues are affecting the staffing of hospitals. The first is the working time directive, which is now Irish and European law. It is being implemented for patient safety reasons because we do not want overworked doctors attending patients. Under the new Medical Practitioners Act there is a fundamental change in the training of junior hospital doctors which is having an impact.

On the question of visas, I have had good discussions with the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform about reverting to a two year visa, and it is agreeable to that. We are currently awaiting a response from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Innovation and I understand we will have it shortly.

On the wider issue, I had a meeting recently with the HSE. It is examining a number of scenarios. Obviously, it is obliged to commit itself to the 2010 service plan, and that it will do. It states we will reduce admissions from accident and emergency departments to hospital beds by 33,000, which is approximately 2% of the numbers who present at accident and emergency. There are a number of community facilities. As the Deputy probably knows, recently the Mater Hospital opened a facility to deal with minor injuries which has been highly successful. The volumes of patients attending it is in excess of anything which could have been anticipated.

A number of initiatives are under way. The HSE is due to revert to me shortly. I do not have the answer to the question on what accident and emergency departments are closing, which the Deputy would love to get. There is no plan to close any accident and emergency departments on foot of the restrictions which are taking place. There may be restrictions. The same issues are being faced in Northern Ireland and the United Kingdom. This week Northern Ireland announced the closure of two accident and emergency departments for similar reasons. We will not close facilties, rather, we will make sure the facilties which are in place provide safe and appropriate care and those that require emergency care are dealt with in the appropriate place.

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