Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I take the opportunity to express the hope that the Minister of State's husband makes a full recovery and that he is in good health. I echo her comments in regard to the hospital staff. There is no doubt about it and all Deputies have reflected on the fact the quality of staff in our health service is extraordinary right through the ranks.

The Minister of State said we need to set politics aside. I have always been opposed to that idea. People sometimes equate partisan point-scoring with politics but they are not the same thing. I and my party have a political analysis of our health service and what is wrong with it. We make no apologies for that and we will not be setting it aside for anyone. This does not mean we cannot co-operate with Government and Opposition Deputies in trying to find areas of common ground. However, I believe we have a different analysis of the manner in which a health service should function.

It is likely that the Minister of State, Deputy Catherine Byrne, and the Minister, Deputy Harris, have heard many Deputies from across Ireland speaking about the situation in their localities regarding people on trolleys. The Ministers, with the Department and HSE staff, will be particularly aware of the situation in Cork given the landmark and significant decisions that were taken there in recent weeks. The scale of the trolley crisis in Cork is enormous. Some 9,150 people spent time on trolleys in Cork from January to November of last year. On stopping somebody on the street in Cork, one would be as likely to find they had been on a trolley in the last 12 months as to have been at a county final or at any number of big public events. The numbers we are talking about affected every community in the city and county, and probably nearly every family. Even today, there are 31 people on trolleys in Cork University Hospital and another ten in Mercy University Hospital, and it was quite a bit more than that on other occasions, with the number reaching 60 at times in recent weeks.

This is nothing short of a national scandal. An item that underlines this is that we learned in recent weeks that 30 patients were transferred from Cork University Hospital to a private hospital. This is a clear mark of the failure of the HSE to deal with the crisis and the failure of its policies. The problems in our health sector have risen to extraordinary levels and our public system is at or beyond breaking point. Léiríonn sé an fhaillí inár gcóras sláinte, an fhaillí i bpolasaithe an Rialtais agus an fhaillí i ndéileáil leis an ghéarchéim inár gcuid oispidéal. It also means that further funds will have been diverted from the public system to the private system which, in different guises, has been a reliable pressure valve for the Government in recent years. Of course, I am glad that people were treated but this is akin to the HSE declaring it can no longer cope and that the public system can no longer cope.

There is a cost to this, however, and we need to know from the Minister what this is going to cost the public system. There are budgets but these have been exceeded in recent years. Already, in January, we are spending money on private care in private hospitals. Clearly, it is essential that people get the treatment they need but it is utterly shocking that the authorities have essentially accepted that the capacity does not exist in the public system. Indeed, the fact there are private hospitals operating and thriving is further proof that the public system is in crisis. Business people have seen a gap in the market and they see the public system is beyond creaking and is collapsing, and they know that people do not have confidence in it. That is truly an indictment of Government policy over many years.

I commend Deputy O'Reilly on what is a very detailed motion which outlines the actions that need to be taken. While I welcome that the Minister intends to support it, nonetheless, I do not believe the Government when it says it will implement Sláintecare. That is not to say I do not believe the Minister of State, Deputy Catherine Byrne, or the Minister, Deputy Harris, but I simply do not believe that Fine Gael and the Government will ultimately throw their weight behind this and make the changes that are necessary. This is not a new problem. Twelve years ago to this day there were 380 people lying on hospital trolleys and that was under a Fianna Fáil Government with plenty of money. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have had almost a century to establish a proper health care system, free at the point of access, but they have not done so. For me, that is a point of ideology and due to the fact they have simply never truly believed in the kind of public system that I believe the public demands and deserves.

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