John Halligan (Waterford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

My first question to the Minister is whether the Bill will prevent a Minister for Health from accelerating projects in specific areas without due consideration for due process. If many of us received copperfastened guarantees that this would be the case, it might be worthy, but somehow I doubt this will be the case.

I was a city councillor in Waterford when the HSE's predecessors, the health boards, were in place. For years I witnessed the most disgraceful waste within the health boards. However, the single agency established to replace them, if it did anything, very quickly created more senior roles in the health sector than ever before.

The HSE's inadequate financial management infrastructure was born of a legacy system from the old health boards. We are all brutally aware of the financial mess the health sector is in as it inefficiently grapples with the €750 million taken out of the health budget in 2012 and the €1 billion taken out in 2011. Many would say with hindsight that the abolition of the health boards and the creation of the HSE was counterproductive. The structure of the HSE is a shambles. Many people have little belief in it; many even have contempt for it, despite their respect for the health professionals working within the HSE, including the nurses and doctors coping day to day with the recruitment ban, restrictions on overtime and cuts in services.

The so-called regional health forums operating throughout the country should be abolished.

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