Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)

Ba mhaith liom ar dtús comhbhrón a dhéanamh leis an Teachta Éamon Ó Cuív faoi bhás a mháthair, Emer Bean Uí Chuív, do ndéanfaidh Dia trócaire uirthi.

Does the Minister recall that 12 months ago yesterday her colleague, the then Labour Party health spokesperson, Deputy Jan O'Sullivan, stated that in the first months of Government "we will lift the moratorium on replacement of front-line staff where beds or operating theatres are closed because of shortage of nurses"? That was before the general election and what we are now seeing is nearly 4,000 health service workers leaving the service early before the end of this month and they will not be replaced, and 1,054 of those are nurses. We now have in excess of 2,000 public hospital beds closed. Is the Minister aware that the Psychiatric Nurses Association of Ireland, PNA, yesterday described the mental health services today as a complete shambles? Those are its words. A PNA survey has shown that up to 400 of its front-line service providers, psychiatric nurses, will be leaving by the end of this month over this tranche of early retirements. That represents 9% of the total complement of psychiatric nurses within the system.

I give the Minister just one example of the effect of cuts because it is important that we understand the impact. Even before the January-February exodus of staff, in the north County Dublin mental health services in the run up to Christmas 17 people sought admission as inpatients and every one of them was refused access. One of them has since tragically died as a result of suicide. When the general secretary of the Psychiatric Nurses Association states, as he did yesterday, that we are facing the horrendous prospect of leaving mentally vulnerable people without any services and that there will be a consequent increase in the suicide rate, not only do we need to take note of the alarm bells he is ringing, we also need to act.

Will the Labour Party - I single out the Labour Party because it has a particular interest in continuing in Government-----

See this speech in context