Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Sinn Féin for bringing forward this motion. Waiting lists are scandalous. It is scandalous that people are suffering as a result of waiting lists. I have a double amputee in a hospital in west Cork who cannot go home because they cannot get home help, so it is in every area of health that the Government has failed the people. The previous Government collapsed on the basis of the health crisis.

Look at areas where patients are waiting to get community hospital beds. I heard the Minister last weekend on about something we have been on about for the past three or four years. He stated that people had better start working in hospitals over the weekend. In the name of God, what kind of planet has the Government been on? That should have been done ten years ago. Where is the Government going? It is making one plan on top of another. It is all only old talk and it is going nowhere. Of course the hospital staff should be working over the weekend and considering having hospitals working 24-7. If someone is seriously ill in bed, why in the name of God would you think that on a Friday evening the illness is going to go away? If a hospital bed is needed, how could you think the illness will not continue to obtain on Saturday and Sunday? Of course, it will.

I mention patients waiting three to five years for cataract operations. Deputy Danny Healy-Rae and I have taken 122 buses carrying such patients to Belfast. That is scandalous. Last weekend, we started what we call the first hip-hop bus to Belfast. It was full of people looking for hip and knee operations going to Kingsbridge Private Hospital on the reimbursement scheme. The Government will pay for those operations anyway. This whole place is a complete and utter shambles. People waiting on the ground for three and four hours cannot get ambulance staff while they are tied up in Cork University Hospital. I could go on forever. It is unreal that the Government has allowed this to happen and to get so bad. The Government cannot control what is happening, it cannot resolve matters and it is not capable of holding office as a result.

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