Michael Harty (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

It has become impersonal, detached and unresponsive in human terms. Bureaucracy is more important than patient outcomes and proper service delivery. Patients become service users and doctors, nurses and allied professionals become service providers. There is a Kafkaesque language used by the HSE. Initially, the apology was made to the service user without referring to her by name or pseudonym. The HSE has developed a language of its own that is technical, detached and disconnected from plain English. Grace's mother has said she does not accept the HSE apology, that she does not trust the HSE and that she does not trust what it says. This lack of trust in the HSE is now widespread among the general public, but when it comes to service delivery, there are many practical managers, doctors, nurses and allied professionals whose work is highly valued and appreciated by the public. HSE management is letting down the public and the front-line workers.

Many people believe there is something rotten at the heart of this case. It is the role of this commission of investigation to find out who was responsible at the various stages of this unspeakable outrage. I hope the terms of reference of the inquiry will be sufficient to get to the bottom of this. I commend the Minister of State, Deputy Finian McGrath, on bringing the terms forward so quickly but I hope they are watertight. I am sure there will be much disappointment that the Grace case is the only one being investigated. I hope that, if there is evidence, other cases will be investigated. The test of this commission is to discover the truth and tell the public in plain English what actually happened. The people of Ireland need to know what happened, who was responsible and what consequences will flow from that. At the very least, the public and front-line workers should expect excellence in management underpinned by excellence in governance. It is a sad reflection on the HSE that a commission of inquiry is required to find out the truth in this case. Good governance is not going to happen unless the HSE is decommissioned and rebuilt in a manner that requires it to have transparency, accountability and good governance, underpinned by a legislative framework to prevent cases such as Grace's happening in the future.

See this speech in context