Eugene Murphy (Roscommon-Galway, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The health section of the programme for Government states: “We will fund hospitals and other healthcare providers for the work they do rather than on the basis of historical budgets”. There is also a reference to creating greater facilities for older people. The Minister for Health came to Longford the other day and had good news for St. Joseph's hospital but he took out the bata mór and gave Opposition Deputies a right lash for raising concerns about proposed health projects. He said we were deliberately using the over-expenditure on the children's hospital to raise such issues. That was a bad statement, bearing in mind that I do not always disagree with the Minister. If one considers Fine Gael's promises in the programme for Government, one notes that, in my locality, there was to be a 50-bed unit for older people in St. Patrick's hospital, a 50-bed unit at Sacred Heart Hospital, Roscommon, and a 50-bed unit at Portiuncula Hospital, Ballinasloe, where there is absolute chaos in the accident and emergency department. Management and others have asked me to plead with the Minister to get the projects up and running. The Government has already delayed them so they are late already. When will Taoiseach announce the projects? Can we see genuine progress on them as quickly as possible?

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