Colm Keaveney (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

It is a shocking thing to lose a child. We all hope to end our days without having to endure such an awful loss. I offer my sympathies to the parents of the babies who died in the Midland Regional Hospital in Portlaoise. I also offer my sympathies to their wider families and friends. Parents suffering such a tragedy deserve to be treated with sensitivity and respect. They also deserve to know the truth, however uncomfortable that may be to the hospital, the HSE, the Department of Health or this House.

Their treatment after the loss of their babies was deplorable, made all the worse by the Government's delay in publishing reports into the incident. The Minister engaged in foot dragging. He did not face the truth when he had it. The serious management and clinical governance failures identified in the report added insult to injury. Often in tragedies such as this, some small comfort can be got from giving an individual who is grieving the opportunity to protect somebody who may become vulnerable because of the failures of the system and to prevent another family from having to endure that kind of pain. The actions and inaction of the Minister and his Department, the Cabinet and the HSE robbed the families involved of that opportunity.

Thanks to political interference relating to the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, the Midland Hospital was told that it would retain its level 3 status. However, this was status without the appropriate level of resources. It might have looked good in the local print media but we see that level 3 status was provided without the resources required to ensure successful delivery of services. We now know that the hospital was not governed, resourced or equipped safely to deliver the level of clinical services required of a level 3 hospital. We now know it was simply a fiction and a failure to deliver to match what the Government announced. The Government has now been found out. This House must stop playing with people's well-being and lives for the sake of political expediency. Providing level 3 status without the resources was expedient and cannot be repeated and the Government ought to apologise for it. Aside from the risks associated with political interference to protect status without providing resources, it has damaged trust and created cynicism about politics. People in that community are raising questions about the role of the HSE and politics and they have every right to be cynical.

The HSE is conducting reviews of maternity services throughout the country. It is akin to Animal Farmin that all reviews are equal but some are more equal than others. I wish to raise the case of one hospital that is receiving some attention, namely, Portiuncula Hospital in Ballinasloe. It was unfairly treated regarding the leaking of information. It may not be of interest to the Government electorally but it is of interest to the people of Ballinasloe because they depend on it, including the accident and emergency department. This community has experienced the closure of a psychiatric inpatient service following a review similar to the one taking place across the country. We were told we would have a better psychiatric service in the context of the centralisation of services at Galway University Hospital, GUH. We now know that staff at GUH are taking industrial action as a consequence of serious issues at that unit. Nurses are expressing concerns about the workload. Unfortunately, their concerns, like those of front-line staff at the Midland Regional Hospital, were ignored. Management is looking at lack of resources on the front line, as happened in Portlaoise. Front-line services are not being progressed to a satisfactory and safe level. This has not been helped by staff shortages and an underspend where resources were sent back to the Exchequer. These shortages are compounding incapacity on the front line and a failure to deliver and protect the most vulnerable people. When the current Minister for Health was appointed, there was great hope that he would address that situation. The physical structure of the psychiatric unit in GUH is leaking, creaking and subsiding. The ceiling is falling in and the unit has poor toilets. This is in contrast to the unit at St. Brigid's Hospital in Ballinasloe which is the only ligature-free facility in this country but which is lying idle. It is political interference. This is what happened in Ballinasloe and Portlaoise. This is disgraceful and is indicative of this Government's failure in this area and the roll out of primary care in particular.

I fear the Minister will hesitate to intervene directly with the resources that are required. We need to ensure that women across this country can have faith and confidence in maternity services. It is little wonder those protesting against the closure of maternity services across the country such as the maternity unit in Portiuncula do not trust HSE because their experience has been pretty awful in respect of how the HSE rolls out its reviews. I am sure the Minister will agree that patient safety will be prioritised and this will be supported by this side of the House. We need to see a review of management and management practices. I am surprised that we have not ensured the greatest form of contemporary governance to address the situation at that facility. Most importantly, the HSE must be made to understand that it must take responsibility for improvements, for accepting criticism and for delivering a modern public service in the context of maternity services.

Senior managers have to become accountable, report back and accept liability, blame and responsibility.

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