Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate the good faith in which the comment was made. I am not going to decide - the Deputy would not expect me to - quality assurance methods on the floor of the Dáil but I will reflect on his point. Part of the international peer review - whatever the mechanism or structure - which I hope can get to work quickly, will look at how our screening programme compares with results in other countries. That could be of significant help in providing assurance.

The Irish Cancer Society, ICS, had some excellent ideas today on how we could provide assurance and information to women. That included the idea of the screening programme writing out to every woman with factual information about the programme, some of the steps taken and probably an apology as well for all the stress and worry caused. I am going to work with the ICS and other advocacy groups on how to best to build that assurance. The Deputy is right. The guidance to the GPs on this issue of repeat smear tests outside of the normal schedule will be issued this week. Before making such an announcement, I discussed it with the IMO and the NAGP, and both welcomed it. I am not speaking for them on the floor of the Dáil but I got a sense from them that they expected many women to turn up in their surgeries anyway. If a woman needed that as part of the reassurance process, then it should be available to her.

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