Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

"Bring it on. Walking away is not in my DNA." These are like cheesy lines from a bad Clint Eastwood movie. I wonder what a woman who has been caught up in the CervicalCheck scandal would think of them. What would an old person who has spent a night on a trolley think of it? What would a young person who is suffering as a result of the Government's neglect of mental health services think of it? What would they think about the idea that Deputy Harris should resign as Minister for Health? I think many of them would support that. The country recently witnessed the second national nurses strike in the history of the State, on the Minister's watch. There is a crisis in recruitment and a crisis in retention, staring the Minister in the face, but he paid no real heed until three days of national strike action woke the Government up and forced the Labour Court to make a recommendation on the issue.

While Deputy Harris is the second Minister for Health to provoke a nurses strike, he is the first in the history of the State to have a national ambulance strike take place on his watch. Paramedics took to the picket lines on 22 January and 15 February but there was not an inch from the Minister's Department. He has effectively forced them to declare for strike again on Thursday or Friday of next week. The issue here is trade union recognition. The Minister could solve it with a stroke of his pen. He says he cannot recognise the union in question as he already recognises three unions in the National Ambulance Service. This union has more members than two of the other three put together and the Minister knows it. He cannot run from this issue.

The costs at the national children's hospital skyrocketed on the Minister's watch. The tender for electrical systems was €98 million. It rose to €157 million. The tender for mechanical systems was €107 million and rose to €177 million. The tender for the main construction project was €432 million. It rose to €556 million. Overall, costs ballooned by €450 million. The Minister knew the companies that he was dealing with. He knew that BAM had overshot its cost estimates at the port of Cork by €12 million. He knew that BAM had overseen a €21 million increase in cost estimates at the Cork event centre. Bidding low, winning contracts and then submitting increased cost claims is nothing new in corporate Ireland. Bring it on. It brought it on and the taxpayer will be forced to pay again on the Minister's watch. We will vote no confidence in the Minister but another Fine Gael Minister would most likely do no better, nor would a Fianna Fáil Government. We have no confidence in Fine Gael or Fianna Fáil, nor do we have confidence in the capitalist market, which continues to play a major role in our health system and which rips the taxpayer off on key construction projects. On that basis, we will vote "Yes" on the no confidence motion in the Minister.

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