Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Go raibh maith agat, a Leas-Cheann Comhairle, and I thank the Tánaiste for his warm words last week following my by-election result. I am deeply honoured to be here to represent Dublin Bay South in the Dáil. It is a great honour indeed.

Following yesterday's health committee meeting, I wish to raise the pressing matter of the proposed new national maternity hospital, which we might say is both a local and very much a national issue. During the by-election campaign the issue of women's health and maternity healthcare was raised with me many times. I heard from women who were due to give birth and who were deeply concerned about the ongoing unduly restrictive practices being adopted in many maternity hospitals and from partners of pregnant women anxious about their exclusion from labour wards. We urgently need to ensure better and more consistent provision for women's healthcare and maternity hospitals. In that context I also heard deep frustration from many people about the tortuous legal negotiations which have been ongoing for so many years surrounding the proposed new national maternity hospital. I heard about the many serious and valid concerns which remain about the ownership and the clinical independence of the proposed hospital. All of us absolutely accept the need for a new national maternity hospital. We agree it should be co-located with an adult acute service. However, without State ownership of the land on which the new hospital is to be built, valid concerns will remain about the clinical independence and the ethical governance of the hospital. We saw an all-party consensus emerge on this in the Dáil in the motion passed on 23 June. The key question I have is what the Government has done since 23 June to ensure that the hospital will be built on State-owned land and that these concerns will be met. We did not get an adequate answer on this at yesterday's health committee hearing.

As someone who campaigned for many decades for repeal of the eighth amendment, I was so glad that in 2018, with repeal, we finally got to a situation whereby women here in Ireland could access the legal abortion and reproductive healthcare we need. However, that progress within our laws with repeal is not reflected in the negotiations on the new maternity hospital, especially, I fear, not in the structures around the Catholic successor company into which ownership of the site is to pass. I have called this syndrome whereby religious entities pass ownership of their assets into an ostensibly lay company the developer's wife syndrome, whereby we see male developers handing over ownership of assets to their wives or spouses in order that the legal liability will no longer attach to the person who holds the assets. My serious concern is that this legal device will be used in this transaction with the national maternity hospital and we will see a Catholic successor company continue to hold ownership even for a long lease. In the eyes of the church, 149 years is not a long time. I am deeply concerned, therefore, that without State ownership we will not have the clinical independence and guarantees that women will have access to all the services we need.

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