Frank Feighan (Fine Gael)

I apologise. More worrying for those waiting on trolleys is that while June is supposed to be a quiet time for accident and emergency, the numbers are not much better than during the winter months. This indicates that the situation is at crisis point.

Despite bumper spending of €10.8 billion on the health budget, funding is not getting through on the ground. Similar problems have been expressed throughout the year at University Hospital, Galway, Mayo General Hospital in Castlebar, the Midlands Regional Hospital in Tullamore, the Mid-West Regional Hospital in Limerick and Naas General Hospital. In April of this year, nurses at Wexford General Hospital worked under protest in the accident and emergency unit because of the intolerable working conditions they had to endure due to a lack of beds and inadequate staffing. The excessive overcrowding in accident and emergency units is resulting in staff being left in unacceptable and unsafe environments.

In November 2002, the Minister stated in his review of the health strategy with the national consultative forum in Dublin Castle:

The health strategy had promised to provide 450 public beds during 2002. By the end of the year, we are on target to have 600 in place, all of them designated for public use only. 109 more will be in place early next year. The money has been found; the money has been allocated.

The Minister promised that the remainder of the beds would be in place by early 2003.