Michael Kitt (Fianna Fail)

I join in the call for a debate on the health service. Senator Brian Hayes made an important point about out-of-hours doctors' services. It appears that there are two levels of out-of-hours service, one after 6 p.m. and another after 12 midnight until 8 a.m. There is a need to discuss the point of contact with the out-of-hours service and the large areas in rural Ireland that a small number of doctors have to cover. When we come to discuss the health service and accident and emergency care, I ask that time could be provided for this important aspect of primary care.

I do not agree with some of the comments I heard from the Department about privatising the GP service or introducing competition. If that were to happen, rural Ireland would never see any of the proposed private health centres that have been mooted. I would not like to go down that road. I put this down as a marker for when we have a debate, which I hope we will have very shortly.