Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I raise the issue of Macroom Community Hospital in the interests of the 38 residents, their families, the staff and the wider community. I would like to see if we can progress things. The hospital offers great care. It is well recognised by the Health Information and Quality Authority, HIQA, the HSE and the locals. One can see that by the demand for places. However, there are issues with the building. They have been identified for many years now. There has been a repeated cycle of plans and commitments and non-delivery and of further plans and commitments and non-delivery, and this goes on. We need to see progress on this. We have seen other community hospitals in similar positions make progress but Macroom Community Hospital has slipped behind.

There is concern among residents, staff and the wider community. People are asking if the national children's hospital's demand for additional funding is going to have some impact on Macroom. As far back as 2008 and 2009, there were plans to carry out development. The HIQA report highlighted the great care, but it also pointed out issues with the building concerning privacy, storage space for residents and the need to move away from the open-ward model to more private rooms. The subsequent HIQA licences were granted on the condition of works being carried out or plans being advanced. That was in 2017 and 2018. I am delighted the Minister of State, Deputy Daly, is taking this Topical Issue matter because I know he has been there and has seen the situation on the ground and the wonderful care provided. He has also seen the need. According to media reports, the Minister of State said that planning permission would be advanced by October of last year.

October came and went, as did November, December, January and February. It is now March and there is still no plan. Members should bear in mind that there was planning permission as long ago as 2008 and 2009. That was allowed to lapse in 2013. We need to get to the stage where there planning application is secured, funding is committed, works are under way and real commitment is shown to Macroom Community Hospital. I discovered when talking with the HSE late last year that €5.8 million was needed for it. Even at that stage, the HSE was expecting planning permission in the first quarter of this year, that is, about March. We have reached that point and there has still been no planning application. We need something definite. We need works on the ground so that residents, their families and the wider community know there is a commitment to Macroom Community Hospital and that the residents are to have the greatest possible comfort. These are basic and fundamental issues, namely, storage space for residents' clothes, privacy and closing off the current open wards. These are practical matters of day-to-day dignity.

In 2016, when there was a demand for the commercial outfits to deliver, they had to deliver within a deadline. However, the hospitals were given an extra five years. That deadline is approaching and the work does not seem to have been done for Macroom Community Hospital, although it was in other cases.

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