Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)

The second report of the organisational review programme, also in reference to the Department of Health and Children, stated among its recommendations that the Department should:

Define its customer and stakeholder groups clearly and align resources, processes and procedures to serve each one in the most appropriate way and at the same time strike an optimal balance in the allocation of resources between competing priorities.

Has the Department implemented this recommendation? Would the Taoiseach agree that speaking of the Department of Health and Children's role of service to the citizens of this State in terms of customer and stakeholder groups is inappropriate and reflective of the thinking that is influencing all that is wrong at the Department, where we have become customers or stakeholders rather than citizens with equal entitlements to access services on the basis of need rather than ability to pay? Would the Taoiseach agree that the Department should consider all the people living in the State as meriting equally its concern and that services across the Department's responsibilities should be delivered in an equitable way, which currently is far from the case? Have the recommendations contained in the second report, which I have referred to, been pursued? Will the Taoiseach join me in urging a revisitation of the terminology used to describe the citizens of this State as customers, which we certainly are not?

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