Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I hear the Deputy in respect of her concerns about Saolta being too Galway-centric but in the discussions yesterday between the Minister and the consultants, it seemed that the emergency department surgical block was the key issue. The issue from hereon in is delivery and whether we can accelerate the timeline in terms of its construction because health capital projects, by definition, tend to be slow to get going and slow to get through the process. We have had these discussions at Cabinet subcommittee level, in particular, with the Department of Health and with the HSE. There is a lot of capital work going on.

It is important in the context of what gets said that we acknowledge the progress that has been made in respect of some of the capital projects and that the CT scanner is on the way. It is a matter of the speed at which we can get that up and running and get it done because consultants are concerned that maybe the existing scanner is not fit for purpose for the long term. We, therefore, need two fully-operational CT scanners at the hospital. That is the Minister's intention. He will press the HSE to deliver this on an accelerated timeline.

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