Seanad debates

Wednesday, 16 April 2003

Central Mental Hospital: Motion.

 

I echo what Senator Glynn said about the staff of the Central Mental Hospital. The conditions are bad for the patients, but they are just as bad for the staff. They must also endure them. To try to ensure a therapeutic milieu in a place like that is verging on the impossible. What they are trying to do is unbelievable – I do not know how they manage it. One former director of the hospital left after about ten years because, as he told me, he felt such a failure for not persuading us politicians to do something about the conditions. That was years ago. Senator Ryan rightly said that if we do something about it, there are no votes in it, but if we do not, there are also no votes. By "we" I mean the Government, but we all have some responsibility in this matter.

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