Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The HIQA report into governance and related issues at Portlaoise General Hospital has been published. It makes for shocking reading, presents an appalling vista in terms of what happened at that hospital and raises a range of issues in terms of patient safety and the needless loss of lives of five young children and perhaps others of whom we are not aware. The report is an extraordinary tribute to the perseverance and persistence of parents who faced obstruction after obstruction in their search for the truth. Despite the latest attempt by the HSE to suppress this report, we witnessed its publication last week.

It is evident from the report that patient safety was not a priority and that there were failures at local, regional and national level in regard to this issue. What is extraordinary is the extent of the repeated warnings which time and again were not acted upon. This morning I received a copy of an e-mail received by one of the parents involved. This e-mail reveals systemic weaknesses and awareness of those weaknesses by senior people within the HSE. Alarmingly, these weaknesses were identified not just in Portlaoise, but in almost every other site across the country. This e-mail was sent by the Chair of the national incident management team, NIMT, to the director of patient safety. In essence, he said that he knows the director is aware that the high rates of harm alluded to are reflective of what is occurring in other jurisdictions also and that the NIMT is aware of numerous sad and serious cases occurring at all HSE sites.

I will repeat that: "The NIMT is aware of numerous sad and serious cases occurring at all HSE sites". This was known at a very senior level within the HSE. Was the then Minister aware of the numerous sad and serious cases at the time? Was the Government aware of what has essentially been revealed as a systemic patient safety issue? I have repeatedly asked in the Dáil when the national patient safety authority would be established but I have received no reply.

Portlaoise was a band 3 hospital, which was confirmed by the Minister at an Oireachtas Committee meeting in 2011 and which means it was to be a 24-hour, 7-day, acute surgery, accident and emergency and maternity hospital. As we know from the HIQA report the investigation team found that the hospital was neither governed, resourced nor equipped to safely deliver this level of clinical services. Furthermore, in 2012 and 2013 the HSE had specifically identified clinical risks associated with surgery and emergency medicine, going as far as to say that surgical services at the hospital should cease. Given that all this was known and given the decision of the Government to make it a band 3 hospital, why were the necessary resources for a band 3 hospital not allocated? Why was the requisite funding that would have gone to other, similar level hospitals, not given?

Given what we now know from the report that very senior people were aware of the systemic safety issues in Portlaoise, how does the Minister for Health ensure proper accountability and responsibility for the needless loss of so many young lives? What steps does the Minister intend to take so that we will get accountability? That is the least the families and parents in this situation deserve.

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