Maurice Quinlivan (Limerick City, Sinn Fein)

I mean no disrespect to the Minister of State, Deputy Collins, but I would have hoped a Minister from the Department of Health would have come in. The last time I had a Topical Issue at least I was told it would be the Minister of State, Deputy Collins, which I appreciated. I had a Topical Issue on crime but nobody from the Department of justice. I want to put that on the record. I will write to the Ceann Comhairle about it because it is bad road to be going down. We are trying to raise important issues to us and we do not get that chance often. It is important that a Minister from the line Department comes in. Again, I mean no disrespect to the Minister of State, Deputy Collins. The Minister of State is from my own county and I know him for a number of years.

The capacity issues of University Hospital Limerick continue unabated and they risk patient safety. In each year since the Fine Gael-Fianna Fáil Coalition was established in 2020, the trolley numbers at University Hospital Limerick have got steadily worse. Already this year, we have seen 12,998 people treated in this manner. In 2024, it was 23,203 people. In 2023, it was 21,400 people and the previous year, it was 18,012 people. The coalition parties have failed again and again to address the capacity issues at University Hospital Limerick. Indeed, since Fine Gael entered government in 2011, there has been a 585% increase in trolley numbers in my local hospital.

Each of those left on a hospital trolley in a hospital corridor is somebody who has presented to the hospital and has been assessed and deemed in need of a hospital bed and yet no bed is available to them. The people of Limerick and the mid-west region deserve much better. The staff at University Hospital Limerick deserve much better. It is not good enough that 1,899 people were treated in June this year in conditions that are devoid of privacy and dignity. For the record, June saw 233 more people treated on trolleys than in June 2024.

Despite this issue being raised on so many occasions in this Chamber for more than five years by me and despite it also being raised on so many occasions by consultant doctors, patient advocacy groups and nurses' organisations, there is no real progress being made.

Last week I had the pleasure of meeting with the members of the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, INMO, the nurses' union. They highlighted how often their members were asked to care for multitudes of patients - numbers that are clearly not safe or acceptable. Nurses, doctors and other medical professions at University Hospital Limerick do their best, in most cases, in the most challenging of circumstances, but they are exhausted. The hospital struggles to retain nursing staff. Who could blame these nurses departing for jobs in places such as Australia and Dubai? Once there, they have job security, a lesser ratio of patients per nurse and accommodation options near their place of work. In Limerick, the average rent is €2,400 per month, and beyond the affordability of many nurses.

We are halfway through the year and already 13,000 people have been treated on trolleys in one hospital. This is an utter disgrace and a complete abandonment of the people of Limerick and the mid-west. A Government that is serious about addressing the obscene nature of the overcrowding in UHL, which has caused the cancellation of elective procedures and excessive emergency department wait times, would have said that the number is far too high. Indeed, I would suggest that such a Government would have taken robust action to stem the tide of increased numbers.

Over recent years, we have had commitments to build two 96-bed units, each of which may deliver an additional 48 beds. While I welcome any increase in capacity, it is simply not good enough. It is not enough when you consider that UL Hospitals Group itself advises a minimum of 400 beds is needed to deal with the capacity. Even that number does not consider the projected population growth in the mid-west region.

This is a crisis. It happens every day and needs an emergency response. Too often, there has been the tragic avoidable loss of life at University Hospital Limerick with the issue of overcrowding deemed a contributing factor. One thinks of the loss of young Aoife Johnston. We are 12 months on from the publication of the Clarke report into Aoife's avoidable death and since then, the capacity challenges at UHL have only worsened.

Last October Sinn Féin brought forward a motion in the Dáil, in part on the establishment of an additional model 3 hospital in the mid-west region.

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