Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Tánaiste said this should not be a matter of NPHET versus the Government and I agree. Everybody needs to get on the same page. It was not me, however, who went on the national broadcaster to take the legs from under our Chief Medical Officer. It was not me who engaged in that type of dangerous behaviour. I put it to the Tánaiste that, if it had been me, he would be the first to stand up and say that it was reckless, that it undermined public confidence and so on. The question is one of capacity. The real reason the Tánaiste made his statement is because NPHET called that out. The reason we are even contemplating these stringent restrictions is the lack of capacity in our health system. The Tánaiste has been Minister for Health and Taoiseach and he has been in government for the past nine years. He has left the State extremely vulnerable with regard to our number of ICU beds. That is the question I have asked, not who knew what, when and where. It is a question of what the Government is going to do as regards ICU beds because its winter plan will fail. It is not enough. The Government is depending on surge capacity and this means closing down other elective care, which means delays in diagnosis and a lack of other crucial treatments. Where is the Government's plan? What is it going to do to address this real issue of capacity, which has not only been raised by those of us in Sinn Féin?

The Tánaiste should talk to people on the front line, the Irish Medical Organisation, IMO, and the managers in our hospitals. They are all singing the same tune. We are seriously stressed in terms of capacity in this State and the winter is going to be very difficult as a result.

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