Denise Mitchell (Dublin Bay North, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The health service is in crisis and action taken by this Government has not made it any better. One just has to look at hospital waiting lists, people left on trolleys, people waiting in accident and emergency, mental health services, early interventions and assessments of need of children. The list could go on. The system is beyond breaking point and no amount of tweaks and small changes will cut it this time. The only thing holding our health service together is the dedication of our front-line staff.

People deserve a state-of-the-art healthcare system but, I am afraid, the system we have falls way short. We do not have to look far to find concrete examples of a health service failing its people. My local hospital, Beaumont, had to cancel nearly 5,000 appointments in the first four months of this year. Roughly 50% of people attending the hospital’s emergency department were left waiting for more than nine hours just to be seen in January, February and March. Patients over the age of 75 waited to be admitted to the emergency department for an average of 17 hours in the same period. The Government and the Minister have failed our health service miserably.

The motion calls on the Government to immediately legislate to make sure there are mandatory safe staffing levels in our hospitals. This is in the interests of the safety of both workers and patients. It must also develop a multi-annual plan that sets out a roadmap for increasing capacity over the next decade and a strategic workforce plan to go with it. The solutions are there and we, in Sinn Féin, have handed the Minister solution after solution time and again but it is time for the Government to open its ears and act in the interests of workers and patients in the healthcare system.

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