Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am glad to have the opportunity to raise the proposed interim move of the Navan, Cork and Kerry ambulance control centres into one unit to be housed at the facility at Townsend Street in Dublin. The plans to create two new state-of-the-art control centres in Tallaght and Ballyshannon to manage all national emergency calls is very laudable and it is in accordance with international best practice. As the Minister of State knows, change is difficult and must be handled very carefully, especially when concerned with such a critical service as this. I doubt if anybody in the Chamber can point to such a critical service from a life-saving perspective as the ambulance service. The ability and capacity of the ambulance service to respond to emergencies should never even be tinkered with at the edges until we can all be confident that what comes after represents an enhancement.

Centralising the system in Tallaght and Ballyshannon, supported by the best personnel, technology and systems available, is a good move. However, it is bizarre in the extreme and, frankly, suspicious that the national ambulance service has unilaterally decided to centralise ambulance control from Navan, for example, and the other centres to a facility in Dublin 2 that will be shared with the Dublin fire brigade service for the moment. This begs the question of why two changes should be implemented over a short period when we only need one. This leads to the final resolution of the issue, which is the development of the facilities at Tallaght and Ballyshannon.

Surely this adds to the cost of change and risk of errors and accidents, as not all the existing control centres operate to the exact same procedures, which is a critical point. They do not have the same systems or formats. Additionally, there are practical concerns held by workers in the ambulance service that the control centre at Townsend Street is not physically capable of facilitating the extra staff and equipment required. This leads me to suspect that the proposed move to a new five-storey state-of-the-art facility in Tallaght may not go ahead at all.

It is important that the Minister of State should use the opportunity today to clarify the matter. When will this move ultimately take place, as there are suspicions that as a result of this interim measure, the ultimate move may not happen, at least in the timeframe laid out? In the meantime, I have yet to hear health and safety concerns around this proposed move being adequately addressed. I have yet to hear a solid rationale or any real justification for the interim measure or be convinced that this move will not potentially adversely impact the ambulance service and its ability to respond in a timely and efficient manner.

If no arguments exist, the ambulance service should ensure that the existing centres in Navan, which covers my area of Louth, and Cork and Kerry should be permitted to continue to operate ahead of the moving of the control aspect to the new national centres in Tallaght and Ballyshannon.

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