Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy and I am with him in this regard. I wish to acknowledge the pain and suffering of the Meehan family. The situation and the case we all saw reported is heartbreaking and shocking. I cannot begin to imagine what the Meehan family have been going through over the past few months. We owe it to them and to every resident in every nursing home to ensure there is a consistently high quality of care and that when people see issues, they can raise a flag in the knowledge that those issues will be taken seriously and will be reacted to.

The Deputy and Members will understand that I cannot go into too much detail here in public about any individual case, even though this case has been widely reported and I acknowledge the Deputy is speaking with the permission of the family involved.

I can stress that since the outset of the pandemic, HIQA has had in place a quality assessment process. All of the designated centres and the children’s residential centres are formally contacted on a regular basis by an inspector of social services to assess how they are coping, the welfare of the residents, any concerns they may have and any deficits identified in continuous high quality care. HIQA, as the regulator, has also completed a risk assessment of all nursing homes. It has not been able to inspect all nursing homes but it has completed the risk assessment. On 6 April, it commenced focused Covid-19 infection prevention and control hub to provide nursing homes with the guidance and support they need.

In answer to the Deputy’s direct question as to timelines, I will find out that information for the Deputy. As it was not part of the question, I do not have the information to hand but I will find out that information for the Deputy.

The other matter worth mentioning is that as the Deputy is aware, an expert group will report to me very shortly on the nursing homes. It is looking at what happened across the system. We all will be interested in what happened. What I am most interested in for now is what learnings there will be to ensure that everybody in those nursing homes, both those who work in them and the residents, is safe and secure. I will continue to work with the Deputy on this issue and will keep him up to date on how it is all going.

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