Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Taoiseach says that nobody wants to see children in agony and pain, but that is exactly what we see. I spoke last night to one mother whose child is now no longer a child. They are now 19 and inoperable. Why are they inoperable? They are inoperable because they waited and waited and waited. The mother said directly that they followed all the right protocols and all the care paths - and for what? Words and rhetoric are of no value to them. The only good faith that matters on this subject is the good faith of the Government. That is the issue. The issue here is that we have 4,000 children awaiting their first consultation. That is the length of the list. We have 270 children on the surgery waiting list, 78 of whom have waited and waited far longer than four months. Here is perhaps the worst feature of all: the most complex and the most desperate of cases in many instances have the longest waits. These families - these children, these young adults, these parents - are now in a state of absolute panic.

I want a concrete commitment from the Taoiseach that he will not simply engage but deliver on the independent opinion and on the travel abroad.

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