Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

We are in full agreement. One of the priority areas for our waiting list action plan is orthopaedics. We know that when people are waiting for operations, be it a hip operation, a knee operation or whatever it might be, they can be waiting in agony and they can be waiting for a long time. When we were in opposition, I was out in Cappagh and I got a very sobering account from the clinicians as to what their patients were going through. It is one of the reasons we have put such an emphasis on the waiting lists.

Deputy McAuliffe will be aware that where people who are waiting just three months for some of the main orthopaedic procedures, the National Treatment Purchase Fund, NTPF, can now arrange care for them as well. That is going well, but regardless of that we cannot rely on additional private sector capacity for this. We need the capacity within the public sector. Croom has been a huge success and we fully intend for Cappagh to rightfully get the significant investment and to let those good folk do the work that they want to do and they know how to do so well.

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