Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy. I want to add to the words of others in expressing my regret at the fact Professor Tom Keane has stepped down as chair of the Sláintecare committee, albeit six weeks before his term was due to end. I met him in Ireland and in Toronto. He is a fine man and I am sorry he is no longer part of this project. Obviously, I regret the fact Laura Magahy has resigned as the programme director.

I think it is important, though, to set out some facts. In contrast to what the Deputy said earlier, €1.235 billion - that is €1,235 million - was allocated to Sláintecare initiatives in 2021, that is this year. I am reminded of Laura Magahy's positive comments to the Oireachtas after the previous budget in respect of the funding delivered by Government to the programme. In her own words, she recognised that €1.2 billion was provided for Sláintecare initiatives this year by this Government. In the most recent progress report on the first six months of the new Sláintecare implementation strategy, the report, which was produced by Ms Magahy, shows that of the 112 deliverables in the first six months, 84 were on track, 25 were in progress with minor challenges and three were experiencing major challenges. Out of 112, 85 are on track, 25 getting there and three behind. This is not my opinion. This is the opinion of the former director herself - €1.2 billion and the vast majority of actions on track - and I think it is important to put that on the record.

A lot has been done on health reform in the past year or so. More than 800 beds were added to our hospital system, the equivalent of two medium-sized hospitals being added to the system, which is extraordinary, with 6,000 more staff, 250 more consultants, thousands more nurses and midwives, an increase in our critical care bed capacity of nearly 50, which is extraordinary when you understand the depth of that, GP access to diagnostics, e-prescribing, something which was talked about forever and is now a reality, remote and virtual clinics and a dramatic reduction in the waiting lists for home care. If anyone is suggesting that reforms have not happened, money has not been spent and progress has not been made, that would be very untrue and very unfair, in my view.

In regard to the RICOs, regional integrated care organisations, something I very much support, establishing them is Government policy to slim the HSE at the centre and to establish more regional autonomy. The Government agreed to that in 2019 but, in fairness to the HSE, since that was signed off by Government, and it was in recent weeks or months of the previous Government, we have had a pandemic, we have had a cyberattack and we have had people working from home. Anyone who has been involved in restructuring an organisation knows how difficult it would have been to proceed with establishing new structures when people are not even in the office and they are working from home in many cases, unable to reapply for new jobs, interviews, redundancy schemes and all those complicated things that have to be put together when we do restructuring. Even leaving aside those difficulties, it had a cyberattack which crippled its services for months and it had to deal with a pandemic. I think the HSE has done a fabulous job in this pandemic in so many aspects of what has been done.

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