Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I do not blame the Minister for the woes of the mid-west health crisis. I blame certain decisions taken by previous governments, particularly the 2009 decision to reconfigure acute hospitals in the mid-west region to deliver centres of excellence that have never materialised. If someone had said 12 or 18 months on that we were working towards excellence that might have been credible, but we are now 14 years on. The Minister is doing a damn good job in trying to build capacity but it has to be admitted on the Dáil record that the 2009 decision was a major mistake.

I would love to know more about those opening hours for Ennis. It has been alluded to that the opening hours of the MAU will improve but we would love to hear whether it will be 18 or 24 hours a day. That is really what people want to hear today.

An application for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre, UPMC, to have an elective hospital in the region has been on the Minister's desk for a number of months. Will he tell us where that is at? We see that as being a game-changer in unburdening some of the day and elective surgery cases from UHL. For the record, because it is often put by Sinn Féin that this is for profit, this is not for profit. It is a charitable hospital that will take huge pressure off public healthcare in the region.

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