Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour) | Oireachtas source

We are in an unprecedented situation. I will raise a few issues with the Minister and his colleagues in the short time available.

I drove up from Tipperary today. We may have become neutralised to the message that people should stay at home. The figures for close contacts, etc., are going in a certain direction but there was quite an amount of traffic on the roads. We and the Government need to re-emphasise the message in this regard. I make a special plea to employers. We need to go back to them. There are many people who are being asked to go into work or who are being told they have to go into work who could work from home. I ask the Minister to re-emphasise this. Obviously, sick pay or the lack thereof, a matter in respect of which we have advocated, is a real issue.

We also must improve dramatically on communications. Forgetting about the personalities, I have said my bit as regards having one person in charge of the vaccination roll-out. I will not repeat it all here. Communications need to be tight. We cannot have multiple Ministers coming out on national radio and making statements that are diametrically opposed. It is not good enough. I do not know why the Minister is shaking his head. The Minister for Justice, Deputy McEntee, did it. Numerous others also did it. The information being provided has to be consistent. We are either going to have confidence in our vaccination roll-out and the figures the Minister is providing or we are not. If a member of the Government is going on national radio or television, can the Minister ensure that what that person says is consistent with what he is saying? There was information going out recently - I do not know whether it is accurate - to the effect that people who had Covid would no longer be a priority as regards vaccination. If that is a myth, the Minister should get someone to dismiss it.

The private hospitals deal is a disaster. It is not what we need. The Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation has come out in support of what I had been saying for many years prior to the arrival of Covid, namely, that we need access to whatever we need access to.

This is a national emergency. The idea that there is a hospital not signing up to this is scandalous. I do not know why it took so long. I suppose there will be a look-back on this at some time.

There is an inconsistency in the approach of some hospitals with high-risk staff being told to come into hospital settings instead of working from home. Will the Minister talk to the Rotunda and some other hospitals where pregnant staff members have been asked to turn up for work? There is an inconsistency with regard to occupational health advice.

Will the Minister honour the commitment he made to hire 8,500 staff for our health service by the end of last year and 12,500 by the end of April this year? Will he give us the updated figures? We must be a long way on the road to that. Will the Minister tell us where we are at with this?

I will not stand here claiming the Minister can work miracles with the vaccine roll-out because he does not have the vaccine. We are part of the European agreement and I hope that European solidarity holds. If it does not hold, then that is a different matter.

I have a serious issue, however, whereby my local hospital in Nenagh has several wards with Covid patients but the nurses and doctors there have not been vaccinated. I know of other locations where people who are not on the front line dealing with Covid patients have been vaccinated. The nurses and doctors in Nenagh deal with Covid patients, in particular those coming out of University Hospital Limerick, but they are not vaccinated. They are as front-line worker as one can be. I am raising it not just because it is my local hospital but the one on which I have got the most representations. While I accept we have a limited amount of vaccine stock, can we prioritise the nurses and doctors who deal with Covid patients? Obviously, it has to be rolled out to pharmacists, GPs and those with disabilities. I understand the pressures. I am not going to say that it is possible for the Minister to do absolutely everything immediately. Surely, however, we can do that.

Several months ago, I spoke here about antigen testing. I did a number of antigen tests myself on my family over the Christmas period to ensure we were protected. Why are we not following the European Commission on this? We know the limitations of this testing. However, considering the situation with this pandemic, in certain settings there must be a role for antigen testing. Can we just deal with that for once? People agree with me on this. If we put antigen testing into certain locations, it will help combat the spread of the virus.

A higher grade of PPE is required for those working on the front line with Covid. With childcare provision, we need to be more innovative. If one looks at the staffing figures, some hospitals will fall over in the coming weeks, even days, if we do not deal with all staffing issues. Childcare is now an issue as we run out of staff.

Will the Government, collectively, at least set a date in the next week or so to make a decision on what will happen on 1 February? We cannot leave this up to the very end. There are too many decisions that must be made. This will fundamentally have an impact on the health service but it will have an indirect impact for schools and a range of other services. If we can make decisions on these early enough, hopefully it will help staffing for our health services and so forth. I cannot see how we will be opening substantially in early February. Accordingly, will the Government make the decision on this as quickly as possible?

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