Emmet Stagg (Kildare North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The system we use for raising topical issues is very useful for Members like myself, but we appear to be falling back into the old trap, where Ministers or Ministers of State come into the House and read a script that was prepared before hearing what we have to say on the issues. The result is that regularly the issues being raised are not addressed at all. This is what has happened today.

I asked some specific questions and while I did not expect the Minister of State to have the answers, I would have been satisfied if he had said he would get the answers for me. I will put my questions again. How can he justify not having an ambulance service in Maynooth when there is, apparently, no savings whatsoever from abandoning it? The system being put in place is no better and is probably more expensive than the system that existed when Maynooth had a full service. I do not accept the notion that Athy and Maynooth are adjacent, as they are an hour and a half apart. A person could have died from a heart attack ten times in the time it would take for the special ambulance to come. However, perhaps the man on the motorbike would arrive to help.

The man on the motorbike would probably cost more than it would cost to send the ambulance which is lying idle in Maynooth, all because somebody decided that five stations in the country should have 12 hours a week with no ambulance service and that a motorbike service would replace them. I do not understand how this could provide any savings. Will the Minister inquire or find out what exact savings are being made, as all of this was based not on more efficient services, but on cost efficiencies? I fought for years to get an ambulance service for Maynooth and we succeeded in getting it. I am not about to allow it be whittled down or reduced so as it will eventually disappear into some larger centre.

Can the Minister of State tell me what happens in Maynooth on a Thursday when the ambulance and crew are not allowed to leave the station? Does the crew sit in it and wait for the 12 hours to be up before they can go out? What has occurred is nonsense. A group in Maynooth and the north Kildare area is organising a protest on this issue and I understand and appreciate that. If we could get some answers, we could explain why this has occurred.

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