Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am pleased to get a few minutes to speak on this subject. Unfortunately, like a lot of debates, the time runs very short. This was the first maternity strategy and it was launched against the backdrop of many years of neglect of maternity services. The reality is that women should feel safe when they go into maternity services. The best outcomes should be achieved for both the women and the babies. One of the amazing things about the system is that when it has to find money, it finds it. We find money for compensation cases that maybe should never have arisen in the hospitals. Compensation will never undo the damage done, no matter how much money we pay. We need to make sure we have world-class services available in our maternity hospitals.

I have raised concerns about this matter in the House previously. Many cases in respect of which there has been a lot of public outrage afterwards arose as a result of the fact that services or facilities on offer or available in the relevant hospitals were inadequate and that staff were overworked. My colleagues have just outlined this in some detail.

I ask that the Minister finds the money and not offer excuses. Some years ago, a person contacted me looking for something from a business I was managing at the time. I have him an excuse and he gave a very simple answer, namely, "Éamon I rang you for the product you have, not for excuses." I put it to the Minister that we get all sorts of reason as to why things cannot happen. All we are looking for here today is quite simple. We are looking for the maternity strategy to be fully implemented so that a uniform service of the highest and safest world standard is available to everybody in all of the maternity hospitals in the State for mothers, mothers to be and infants who enter those services. This should include gynaecological services and so on. It would avoid the kinds of cases that have arisen all too frequently in recent years. I put it to the Minister that it is not a lot to ask. The Minister has found such money for other services. It can be found and I ask that the Minister goes to find it to implement this strategy now.

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