Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick East, Labour)

We only have 15 minutes left and I do not want to spend too much time on this either. In some ways, it is a discussion which we should be having in a broader context because there is considerable frustration. As health spokesperson I find it frustrating in terms of getting information on a wide variety of issues. For example, the reports on reconfiguration of hospital services were secret until in my region the Labour Party managed to get its hands on it and decided to publish, and then the HSE published it. That is just one example but it is extremely difficult to get information on the health services in general. It would make life so much easier for all of us in our public function. I do not mean we are trying to get this information as some kind of personal curiosity. It is in our public function, as representatives of the people, that we need this information but it is extremely difficult to get it.

Our quarterly meeting with the Minister and Professor Drumm is coming up in the next month and with the number of questions that have been tabled by members of the Joint Committee on Health and Children, these meetings are getting ever longer. We have no way of getting the information, except in that quarterly face-to-face meeting.

I do not want to spend all the scarce time we have left on this issue but it is one on which we need to have a full debate in some other context in the interests of our representative democracy so that people can get the information they require on the health services, which are such an important area of our lives and also such a significant element of public spending in the context of tight resources. This is something that needs wider debate. I support the amendment.

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