Denis Naughten (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent) | Oireachtas source

There are three official ambulance blackspots designated by the National Ambulance Service, namely, Tuam in County Galway, Mulranny in Mayo, and the west Roscommon-east Mayo area. The National Ambulance Service has spent €1.74 million putting in new ambulance stations at each of those locations, including at Loughglynn in County Roscommon in the case of the west Roscommon-east Mayo area. The new policy of the ambulance service of dynamic deployment means there no longer needs to be an ambulance station but only a parking bay and toilet facilities for ambulance crews. We have a situation now where the facilities are there but there are no ambulances.

Based on a comparison with Northern Ireland, we have approximately one third of the ambulances needed to provide an adequate emergency service across the country. As I said, bases have been installed in the three nationally recognised ambulance blackspots, yet we have no money to provide ambulances or crews to serve those bases. As a result, the National Ambulance Service is obliged to borrow ambulances from Ballinasloe, Galway, Castlebar and Roscommon town, with those stations left scrambling to find vehicles to respond to emergencies. This is the reason we are failing to meet the HIQA targets for the west, where fewer than one in every two ambulances arrives within the 90 minute target and where, in fewer than one in five cases, a first responder, be that a paramedic, doctor or a person with a defibrillator, arrives on the scene within eight minutes.

People argue that it is all about outcomes. However, if there is no ambulance and no first responder at the scene of an incident, there will not be a positive outcome. It is important to bear in mind that these are HIQA standards. The Government has used standards set by that independent body to justify its reconfiguration of other services. The existing ambulance service needs to be reconfigured to meet the standards that have been set out and the requirements of the public. What is happening at the moment in my part of the country is a case of death by geography, because we do not have the required number of ambulances. We need more ambulances and more ambulance crews, and we need them now.

See this speech in context