Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the members of the Rural Independent Group for bringing forward the motion. I commend them on the concise nature of the motion, which has captured many of the difficulties in our health service. It is very timely that we are debating this matter this evening in the face of yet another scandal. The Government may go down in history as one that was dogged by scandals. It is my estimation that it definitely will. It is not lost on the women of Ireland. Never have they been mentioned so many times. We are so grateful for all the mentions we get. Time after time, the scandals that emerge affect women, including the scandals associated with sodium valproate, breast cancer misdiagnosis in St. James's Hospital and the scandals in Portlaoise and Portiuncula hospitals. These are just a few. Now we have to add to them another scandal, that of CervicalCheck.

Anyone who watched the performance of the HSE officials at the meeting of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Health last Wednesday could not fail to have been struck by the arrogance and complete abdication of responsibility for the service in the charge of Mr. Tony O'Brien. His utter refusal to take responsibility for the organisation he heads has angered not only me — it did anger me — because is has made the women of Ireland very angry. Mr. O'Brien, in response to the question on whether he is doing a good job, shrugged his shoulders and simply said "Yes". This was absolutely outrageous. Why does he do it? It is because he gets away with it. It is because the Government circles the wagons.

There is not a person in this Chamber or this complex who has expressed confidence in that particular individual's ability to do his job, yet he is still in his position. We will not see him tomorrow because, apparently, he is on holiday. Good luck to him with that. He will not appear before the health committee for the quarterly meeting, apparently. He had planned on taking annual leave and that is why he will not be there. It is because of the attitude of the Government that he behaves in the way he does. The wagons were circled; the protection was there for him. He had no need to answer any questions. He had no need even to pretend to take responsibility for the organisation that he heads because he knew he was going to get the protection of this Government. Contrast that with the position of a nurse starting her shift in an emergency department tonight. Does the Minister believe she feels protected to that level? She does not. She absolutely does not because she knows that, with the failings in the health service, her head would be on the block. She sees that those who are at the top, or those who refuse to take responsibility time and again, will be protected. They are obviously very valued. The nurse working in an emergency department does not feel valued.

I sat here and listened to the Deputies from Fianna Fáil bemoaning the state of the health service. Members will know, because I have said it before, that before I became a Deputy I represented workers under a Fianna Fáil Government and a Fine Gael Government. I was not impressed by either, and I do not believe the workers were either. Let us not forget that many of the issues we face in the health service today have their root in the recruitment embargo, which was brought in by Fianna Fáil two years ahead of the one for every other department. When we say we have a recruitment and retention crisis, we need to go right back to where the recruitment and retention crisis started. It started with the recruitment embargo. It was a crude tool and it was resisted by the unions at the time. There was no reason for it but the Government ploughed ahead with it regardless. When we consider the crisis in recruitment and retention, we can see the health service has become a very cold place for those who work hard. Those people are voting with their feet and they are leaving.

Once again, I thank the Rural Independent Group for this motion and putting it on the record that there will be no change in our health service unless and until those at the top of it are accountable.

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