Maurice Quinlivan (Limerick City, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Too many aspects of our health service are failing. In my city, the emergency department in University Hospital Limerick, UHL, is under significant pressure, as are mental health services, particularly youth mental health services. According to theIrish Examinertoday, 700 patients in Limerick, Nenagh and Ennis had operations cancelled in the past six weeks alone.

Other challenges facing our hospitals in terms of capacity and staff retention are also facing our ambulance service. Everywhere we look there are challenges and at every turn, the Minister has fallen far short in addressing those. Like far too many of our health professionals, our ambulance staff continue to do tremendous work with limited resources and with limited support from the Government.

The paramedics and the operational staff deserve tremendous credit for their performance and the reality is there is just not enough of them. Regardless of what figure you look at, it seems that the trends are going in the wrong direction. Response times have increased by 50%, with the national average response time to call-outs now standing at 27 minutes. The ambulance service has advised that it urgently needs to recruit staff as demand for its services is increasing. The ambulance service employs 2,000 people and its workforce plan advises that this needs to be doubled by 2026. Scotland, which has a similar population to Ireland, has 5,000 people employed in its service. Our ambulance service has been run into the ground over the last ten years and this is showing as average response times and patients' experiences have worsened. The unavoidable reality is that emergency call-outs are taking longer because the ambulance service is understaffed.

I have met the NAS and unions representing their members with our health spokesperson, Deputy Cullinane. They explained to us that paramedics are burnt out and totally exhausted. The ambulance service spent €18.8 million on overtime in 2021, with two thirds of paramedics working significant overtime every month. There is an urgent need to address training places for paramedics and invest in ambulance services to recruit and retain paramedics. Without an uptick in recruitment, we simply will not meet the 2026 target of doubling the current NAS staffing levels. The problems in our hospitals are contributing to the issues in our ambulance service. The offload times in hospitals are being prolonged and this is contributing to the capacity and staffing issues in our hospital workforce. The number of people being treated on trolleys in my local hospital, UHL, stands at 1,561 for the month of February, which is a truly shocking figure. In February, an average of 82 people on trolleys every single day was recorded. The accident and emergency department at UHL cannot cope with the influx of patients, with an average of 240 people presenting daily. The causes of the crisis in our health service are multifaceted and this Government shows no sign of being able to deliver. The staffing response times in our ambulance service are putting patients at risk. Our trolley crisis is putting patients at risk.

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