Paul Donnelly (Dublin West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

This matter has shocked the entire country. The reports we have are truly shocking. The failure of the system's checks and balances to ensure appropriate treatment is, again, shocking. The use of non-medical springs is quite unbelievable. Children with scoliosis expected, sometimes after being on a waiting list for years and after disappointments, cancelled appointments and cancelled operations, that they would get first-class treatment but were let down time and again, with the CEO of the HSE admitting that communication with affected parents "could have been better". What an understatement. The spina bifida and hydrocephalus group held a remote meeting with over 100 families in Temple Street and in Crumlin. They are rightly angry about the situation and fear the surgery delays it is set to cause. It is rightly demanding that the review cover much more than medical issues. That has been heard time and again today. It needs to encompass licensing concerns, legal concerns, waiting list delays and the management of waiting lists. It is about much more than medical affairs. The group believes there has been an attempt to have a narrative around one surgeon and one issue instead of taking an opportunity to look at the wider piece, when it is widely known that the services have been in crisis for many years. We have heard this in the Dáil over the years. A review of spinal surgery at Crumlin hospital has been undertaken but has not yet been published by Children's Health Ireland. Who is running the communications for the HSE? An internal review has been carried out in Crumlin. The parents do not know which children's files are being examined; it could be anyone's child.

They said it could be their children. They have been left to assume. What way is that to treat the children involved and their parents?

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