Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)

I agree with the Taoiseach that this is clearly an environmental, cultural and systemic failure. Of course, the parents and children most directly and desperately affected urgently require an independent review. However, we need to hear more from the Taoiseach and the Minister for Health – the Taoiseach is, of course, a former health Minister – about the systemic changes that will be made to address the much bigger failing that is clearly at the heart of these terrible individual tragedies for children who are now being told they may have had unnecessary surgery.

What is the Government going to do to address the systemic and environmental issues in CHI? A drip-feed of resignations from the board is simply not enough. That is just twiddling at the edges. We need to know what will change to make sure that there is a proper culture in CHI that ensures individual clinicians cannot run amok, abuse the National Treatment Purchase Fund or carry out procedures in a sort of vacuum and splendid isolation without the holistic approach the Taoiseach rightly said was necessary. Parents and children require a sense of systemic change.

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