Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

The Green Party supports the Sinn Féin motion. I also want to specifically thank Caitriona O'Neill and William Gallagher who wrote a letter to the Minister for Health on their father's tragic and sad case. I believe they did a huge public service in that regard. It is easy when one thinks of numbers to think in the abstract. When one brings it back down to the personal, which Caitriona O'Neill and William Gallagher did in describing what happened to their father, it makes it real, tangible and urgent. We all have seen it in our families, even if in different circumstances. The fact that Catriona and William have real medical expertise in cancer and nursing care gives them real authority when they say it is not acceptable or right that a 75 year old man had to spend three days on a hospital trolley when he required palliative care and certain basic procedures but was unable to get them in that time. It is something by which we are all shamed and it should end.

It is about the provision of physical infrastructure and beds. However, we have to be careful and consider what kind of beds. Should they be respite, long term or hospital care beds? We have to be strategic and smart in how we respond. We have to promote and advance investment in ehealth to ensure we get the best use of our resources. The lack of measurements and understanding is a problem. I have been told the HSE still operates in a fax-and-letter world. To ensure we use resources well, we have to embrace digital technologies, as well as the sharing and use of digital information, to be efficient in what we do. We need to do everything differently. We need multi-annual budgets, not annual budgets where there is a fight and tussle with finance. We need new commissioning groups to ensure the move towards primary and preventive care, which we all agree is the cornerstone of Sláintecare. This will mean it is not just hospitals running the entire system, but that there is oversight of how we allocate resources across the system to make it work. The trolley emergency crisis is the pinch point of an overall dysfunctional system. We need to change the entire system to get rid of that pinch point and ensure there are no further cases where the likes of Michael Gallagher are left for three days in a condition which no one can accept or allow.

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