Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Minister of State rehearsed the party line very predictably. We can agree on one thing, namely, that the issue of the health service should not be reduced to the status of a political football. There is a need for a conversation right across society about what kind of health service we want and how we can get to a universal system of health care that is free at the point of delivery. That needs to be at the core of the next general election. If members of Government and, perhaps, others go out and engage in auction politics, promising to decimate the tax base, they then need to explain how we will arrive at that universal health service - how we will finally end the scandalous situation of our accident and emergency departments, of waiting lists and of people in agony, some of them almost despairing, as they wait in real physical pain for treatment. I deal with people like that on a daily basis.

It is often said that the measure of a society is how it treats its most vulnerable. Arguably, the measure of Government is how it provides for the basic needs of its citizens, particularly those who are in a vulnerable position. If we apply that yardstick, it is a damning indictment, not just of this Government but also of previous Administrations. The Minister of State mentioned older people. In the midst of this crisis in our emergency departments, the very idea of elderly people lined up on trolleys, toe to toe, on narrow, clogged corridors, with insufficient nursing staff to care for them is truly shocking and intolerable. It is a most undignified way to treat any patient, never mind our elderly. These are people who built this State and paid their taxes, and now they find themselves at their moment of need - in some cases in their twilight years - when they most need the supports of the State and when they are weak and vulnerable, lying on a trolley in a hospital corridor. In the Orwellian world of Leo’s hospital horror, these elderly patients are lucky because they could be on a chair. Worse still, they might be forced to sleep on the floor, as happened in the Mater hospital in my own constituency.

In the course of this debate - this is not unique - I had a communication from one man whose name I will not mention, but who is watching this exchange. He wanted the Minister to know that he presented at the Mater hospital last Saturday morning with a suspected heart attack and spent 19 hours on a chair. Thankfully, he has now had his surgery and has had a stent inserted.

This is not about a political football; it is about the politics of failure. It is an ongoing failure, but at this time it is on the Government's watch. The situation at the Mater hospital has not improved. In 2011, when this Government came to power, there were 3,936 unfortunate people lying on trolleys in the Mater hospital. Fast forward to 2015 and the number rises to 4,704. That is the reality. Most people have their most critical and sometimes traumatic experiences in the health system in emergency departments. This is intolerable. I have no interest in having a partisan ding-dong across the floor of the House on these issues, although if that is what it takes to get them the attention and resolution they require, so be it. What I do want us to see in the course of the election campaign is an honest, costed discussion about how we get from chaos to stability, from a broken, banjaxed two-tier system to a single universal health care system. That is what Sinn Féin's plan addresses, that is what we want, and that is what we want to debate and - I hope - agree with the Government and with the people.

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