Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)

Last week, a record-breaking number of 569 patients were on trolleys and chairs in the accident and emergency departments of our public hospitals, and today's figure is 442. I know the Minister and the HSE consistently refuse to accept the figures presented by the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation. As in so many other areas, the Government has its own figures, but few are buying it. I do not propose that we have any further tussle about that.

In 2006, the Minister said that the accident and emergency situation was a national crisis. Yet the figures last week were even worse than at that time in 2006. The Minister is entitled to her break, but she was not in the country at the time. For example, at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda, which is in my own region and Deputy Morgan's constituency, the highest ever number of patients on trolleys was reported. The equivalent of two full wards were waiting for admission from the emergency department. I ask the Minister to consider that for a moment. Was she aware that two full wards of patients were waiting for admission in the emergency department of Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda? That has been correctly described by the INMO as being extremely dangerous for both patients and staff.

The INMO has called for an urgent meeting with the management of the HSE. Does the Minister not recognise that this is the same management that had given commitments to achieve efficiencies in order to alleviate overcrowding when it went ahead with its own plans, which were described as the reconfiguration of hospital sites across the north-east region? These had a direct impact on the accident and emergency services at my own local hospital, Monaghan General Hospital, as it was then known, and at Louth County Hospital in Dundalk. None of the commitments or promises from the HSE management has ever come to anything in terms of making good the beds that were lost across the region or dealing with the current outrageous circumstances.

Does the Minister not accept that the increase in overcrowding due to bed closures and the downgrading of hospitals across our region was correctly predicted not only by this Deputy and other voices in this Chamber, but by the INMO itself, and that the results we are seeing today are consequent upon those actions? Let us be clear. A total of 1,500 beds were closed before budget 2011 was introduced last month.

I again ask the Minister whether she has assessed the impact of budget 2011 on the crisis across our public hospital accident and emergency departments. That is something she did not mention in her response. I am anxious to know whether the Minister has carried out any impact assessment of the measures proposed in budget 2011, not only in the current year but also over the period of the four year plan to which she is a party.

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