Joe McHugh (Donegal North East, Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Shortall. I acknowledge the role of the Friends of Letterkenny General Hospital in raising €500,000 of necessary funds towards a cardiac catheterisation laboratory in Letterkenny. The group intends to raise a further €700,000 to bring the total funding to €1.2 million. This represents a vast amount of fund-raising. This is an example of the positive effort of so many groups throughout the country. They are aware of what is needed in a particular area and they are willing to put their shoulder to the wheel.

The group is not working separately but in conjunction with management and consultants. This is not a separate fund-raising initiative. The United Kingdom NHS has pointed out that in 2015 there will be a significant deficit in cardiac catheterisation capacity in Northern Ireland. Letterkenny General Hospital has the only HSE-employed interventional cardiologist in the north west. Funding has been approved for a second cardiologist there. It has the capacity to build on an existing strength. The danger with cross-Border co-operation and all the associated challenges is not to acknowledge the strength of one particular hospital. Altnagelvin Area Hospital has its strengths and Letterkenny General Hospital has its strengths. There is a real opportunity here to build a critical service that will facilitate not only the population of Donegal or north Leitrim but also patients from Derry to Tyrone.

When we discuss cross-Border synergies and co-operation it is important to place a value on the existing strengths and capacities at particular hospitals. If there is an interventional cardiologist in Letterkenny, the only one in the north west, approval for a second cardiologist and community commitment and involvement in respect of fund-raising, then we should bring all of this together and tap into the goodwill. As legislators, we will not be rewarded in any way by the community if we bypass its wishes.

It is important to note the proactive role of the Minister with responsibility for health in Northern Ireland, Mr. Poots, and his close co-operation and working relationship with the Minister of State, Deputy Shortall, and the Minister for Health, Deputy Reilly. They have worked to analyse possible solutions in these straitened times. Perhaps in five or ten years time there will be a whole new landscape. Altnagelvin Area Hospital could work with Letterkenny General Hospital and Erne Hospital could work with Sligo Regional Hospital. We need to ensure at the beginning that the turf wars that have prevailed in hospitals and that will continue to prevail in future do not become the raison d'être of service provision. There is a capacity at Letterkenny General Hospital to provide this cardiology service. The team, the commitment and funding are in place as well as Government approval for a second cardiologist. We should honour this and we should be careful about how we move in the advanced co-operation between two hospitals on different sides of the Border. Everyone has the same overall objective, that is, to provide quality service for the people living in the north west.

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