Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Listening to the Minister’s speech earlier is in stark contrast to the experience of the vast majority of the public out there who attend our hospitals and, indeed, the staff who work there. In my constituency, Sligo University Hospital has been in crisis for many years because of understaffing and under-resourcing. Last September, the INMO industrial relations officer, Neal Donohue, said that the conditions in the department were so concerning that they had no choice but to call on the HSA to intervene and conduct an urgent inspection. It was claimed that there are real issues of risk of fire, injuries, and additional infections in the hospital. These issues are ongoing. I spoke to a man whose wife was taken to hospital and stayed overnight on a trolley in the emergency department while waiting to get a bed. That is the normal experience of so many people because the staff are not there to provide the service.

On 8 February 2023, the Irish Medical Organisation warned that the ongoing capacity crisis in our health system is directly leading to sustained and critical risks to both patients and healthcare staff on a daily basis. Everybody else except the Minister cannot be wrong. We seem to be hearing everyone other than the Minister - all of those who have experience of being in hospital, all of those working in hospitals and every professional body that represents staff in hospitals - saying there is a crisis and a huge problem with understaffing. When the Minister comes into this Chamber, however, he tells us that there is no real problem, that we have recruited more staff than we have before, and that there are little bits of teething problems but everything is okay. That is not the case. The experience of people is that we have a crisis and we need to deal with that crisis.

The crisis expands beyond the emergency departments and into all aspects of our hospitals. There are huge problems due to the staffing crisis in our mental health services, in particular. Child and adolescent mental health services, CAMHS, are under huge pressure, as are adult mental health services. I know of a case involving a man who has been a mental health patient for many years. He was suicidal and had to go to an accident and emergency department because there is no emergency service in mental health services. This serious problem needs to be dealt with across the country.

We also have problems with diagnostics. Diagnostics in most of our hospitals are working on a 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. basis. That is not appropriate when we have hospitals open 24-7. They should have a 24-7 diagnostic service. What happens outside of the hours from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. is that people come in on emergency calls and it simply does not work.

The reality for the vast majority of people out there is that the system is broken. The Minister needs to acknowledge that rather than telling us stories about how great things are.

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