Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

On behalf of Fianna Fáil, I wish to extend our thoughts to the mothers, fathers and babies at the centre of the Portiuncula University Hospital report. What the report highlights is truly outrageous and scandalous. The report on maternity services at Portiuncula University Hospital was released approximately two months ago. It did not get much attention because we were in the middle of the CervicalCheck scandal and a campaign to repeal the eighth amendment. The report lays out a scandalous series of failures in respect of mothers, fathers and babies by the State. The bitter irony is that the report on this scandal relating to women's reproductive health did not get much attention when it emerged because we were preoccupied with two other issues relating to women's reproductive health.

By and large, we have great maternity care in Ireland. We have one of the lowest maternal death rates in the world thanks to the fantastic work every day of our doctors, nurses, midwives and everyone else involved. When it comes to women’s health and the control of women’s bodies, however, this State has a dark past - the Magdalen laundries, mother and baby homes, symphysiotomy, forced adoptions and falsified birth certificates. The list goes on and on. Now added to that list is what happened at Portiuncula hospital between 2008 and 2014 and who knows when else at that hospital.

A total of 18 births were examined. Six involved either stillbirths or the death of the baby shortly after delivery. Six of the babies who survived suffered injuries leading to lifelong disabilities. A litany of errors led to the serious harm and deaths of those babies. The report found that in ten of the 18 cases there was a relationship between errors made and the outcomes for the health and lives of those children.

What happened? The report found there were insufficient resources; insufficient weekend cover, with sometimes no obstetrician and no midwife at the weekends and out of hours, so who was delivering the babies; insufficient leadership; insufficient management and quality control; the wrong staff at the wrong times; the wrong training; the wrong qualifications; and the wrong layout of the hospital. The list goes on. The report concludes that all of these errors combined to lead to the serious harm and death of babies. That serious harm was preventable. Sadly and soberly, those deaths were also preventable.

After all of this came the failure to investigate; the failure to tell parents that mistakes were made; the failure to tell parents about coroner reports and investigations; the failure to tell parents that a review was even taking place; the failure to inform the Minister for Health; and the repeated failure to apologise.

RTE’s "RTÉ Investigates" told the story of just one such family, whose two baby girls died in Portiuncula hospital. A review of one of the deaths took place in 2011. The parents were never told about the review, nor were they included in it. They found out about the review on television years later. When they found out, they applied for information under data protection legislation and what they discovered was damning. It included, for example, one email from a person at the hospital saying: “Obviously, I am concerned that the coroner’s directive to carry out a review will be discoverable.” That is a cover up. That is what happened. In 17 of the 18 cases the report found a lack of disclosure.

We welcome the recommendations and we welcome the Minister's list of things that have improved, but it is not enough. I am asking the Minister to come back with a comprehensive report listing every recommendation in this report, stating what has happened to date, which have been completed, which have not been completed, and the timeline for when that will happen.

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