Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

We have seen chaos in accident and emergency departments. The trolleys have been jammed together. The patients are toe-to-toe.

The scandal of closed public wards has already been mentioned but no Deputy has yet mentioned that there were cases of other empty beds during this crisis too, sometimes just hundreds of metres away from the chaos in the accident and emergency departments. I am talking about the empty beds in private hospitals and in private wards. What a scandal that this is so when public patients suffer.

When Cork University Hospital, CUH, purchased ten private beds at the Mater Private Hospital in Mahon on 7 January it made national headlines. There were ten beds to buy and the same was done elsewhere. One could ask how many beds lay idle during the crisis over the past fortnight. We do not know because the private hospitals are under no obligation to release the information. However, we have anecdotal information. In an interesting article in the Irish Examiner, Fergus Finlay described how a majority of the beds in a private ward in which he spent time recently were empty.

We must reverse the austerity health cuts of recent times. That means thousands of new beds in public hospitals, but we also need a planned, rational use of resources to meet the challenges of public health care, including emergencies. It also means putting all of the country's health resources at the disposal of society, which in turn means nationalisation of the private hospitals and of those private beds. We must fight for every bed.

At Bandon Community Hospital, County Cork, there are currently 13 beds not in use because of a dispute over staffing levels. If the HSE were to simply hire one extra nurse and two extra health care assistants, those beds could be brought into play more or less immediately. The three extra staff should be hired immediately.

At Cobh Community Hospital, County Cork, 44 beds are currently in jeopardy because of the hospital's financial viability under a section 39 model. If the hospital is upgraded to a HSE hospital then the beds would be guaranteed, but the HSE will not do that as it would mean increasing pay rates. It is ludicrous to put 44 beds in jeopardy for that reason. The hospital should be made into a HSE hospital, the wages should be increased and those vital 44 beds should be saved.

The European Commission says there will be a global shortfall of 1 million health care workers by 2020 and that 600,000 of them will be nurses and midwives. Nurses and midwives are part of a globalised labour market and the Union of Students in Ireland, USI, recently found that 92% of student nurses and midwives were considering emigration, largely for reasons relating to pay. Last year, according to the INMO, 1,400 of 2,000 nurses and midwives who left the HSE did so because they resigned. Many went to Britain, Australia or Canada while others went to the private sector where pay is higher to the tune of thousands of extra euro per annum. It is clear that we will continue to have a crisis in terms of the retention of nursing staff until such time as they are granted very significant pay rises.

As a Solidarity Deputy, I consider myself a workers' representative in Parliament and have made a point during this crisis to talk to hospital workers and listen to their point of view. In Cork I have listened to stories of wards crammed full of potential flu victims with just three or four thermometers at hand for the entire ward. I have heard stories of Dinamap monitors so frayed and worn that attempts to take accurate blood pressure readings were hampered. I have spoken to ambulance staff who have completed 14-hour shifts without time to break for a proper meal. In general, I have heard stories of front-line workers under pressure from a crisis but then put under even greater pressure by a shortage of resources, including human resources.

I believe this crisis has made the case more clearly than words could ever do for an Irish national health service unshackled by cuts and privatisation. For sure there is a crisis in the NHS in the UK but that must be addressed by going forward to the original principles of its founders, not by going back to the public-private model which we have here. In conclusion, I urge the Minister to reverse the bed cuts, pay the nurses and health staff a living wage, invest in primary care and establish an Irish national health service unshackled by cuts or privatisation.

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