Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Over four years into this Government's term of office, we still have no proper roll-out of universal access to general practitioners, GPs. This was a stated Government policy. We learned as late as yesterday that a reported 50% of GPs have signed up for the under sixes contract. The figure is as low as 8% in County Tipperary. It stands at 32% in parts of Cork city and county. The figures for counties Clare and Louth are 29% and 22%, respectively. Large tracts of the country are to be left without access to GP services for under sixes under the new contract. While we did not oppose the Bill that made provision for the under sixes contract, we made the point from an early stage that primary care was simply being under-resourced and starved of funds and services. GP services are now beginning to fold across the country, which is an unsustainable position. At the same time, the Government is continuing to pretend that its stated primary care strategy, which involves investing in GP services, is the way forward in terms of maintaining people in the community and keeping them out of the acute hospital system. It may have escaped the notice of the Tánaiste that a couple of weeks ago, a 102 year old woman who had received a blood transfusion had to lie on a trolley in a corridor at the emergency department in Tallaght for over 24 hours.

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