Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

With regard to the question of misery, when I refer to publicly available data to counter the figures put forward by the Opposition, why is it acceptable for me to be accused of trying to normalise a bad situation? Nobody, least of all me, has said it is good to have anybody on a trolley. Of course it is not. It is socially unacceptable. We have to do a hell of a lot more. I am not going to stand here and allow Deputy Kelleher to decide the narrative. I am going to follow the evidence and see where it brings us. Every single day so far in November, there have been fewer patients on trolleys. I will send a copy of those figures to the Deputy. Perhaps I will put them on the record of the House. The idea that the Deputy has decided that this is the worst winter ever, even though the winter period just started at the beginning of this month, is not factually backed up. That is not to say we do not need to do much more. The Deputy is particularly right when it comes to older people on trolleys. That is why we are putting in place a programme of frailty teams. This will mean that older people are streamed to geriatricians when they come through the doors of our emergency departments. We need to do more with home care packages. Funding has been provided for an additional 45 home care packages each week from now until the end of the year. This will be sustained throughout 2018. More transitional care beds are being provided. More hospital beds are being opened. An additional 60,000 flu vaccines are being given out this year. We have a lot to do. The statistics show that some hospitals are making progress.

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