Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail)

It is not just the Department of Health; it is also the Department of Transport. If we table parliamentary questions to that Department, they are forwarded to the National Transport Authority or Transport Infrastructure Ireland. A large number of agencies have been set up over many decades. The all-important stuff we try to do as TDs gets siphoned off in different directions, and it can sometimes take months to receive replies. I had a reply to a parliamentary question come back recently in respect of someone who has since passed on. Luckily, I was able to intercept the reply in my office and tell my staff not to send it out. It would have been the grossest insult to the family involved if the reply had gone out.

The Minister is a very good person. She is a good person to be leading the Department. I saw her at the University Hospital Limerick a few months ago. The gloves were off and the sleeves rolled up and she was down those corridors to see how it was functioning for better or for worse. I have every faith in her in the months ahead.

HIQA has reported to the Minister. There is something on her desk we would all love to see. I refer to the HIQA report on the future of healthcare in the mid-west region. It was being withheld until the arrival of the ESRI's report. It is due out in September, I think.

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