Brendan Ryan (Labour)

The lives of Palestinian children are as precious as those of Israeli children. Until we develop an even-handed policy which tells all those who choose to kill children, either deliberately or through irresponsible military activity, that the killing of children is a profound crime against humanity and that we will not tolerate the commission of such crime by any side in this conflict, we are essentially complicit in a de facto racist distinction between the value of Palestinian lives and that of Israeli lives. We are part of it because we have tolerated the EU's assault on the elected Government in Palestine. A debate on this issue is so badly needed that I am not prepared to make the usual concession of waiting until the autumn. We need to hear the Minister for Foreign Affairs explain how we can justify the present situation.

A report in the health supplement of yesterday's edition of The Irish Times referred to the putting on hold of several hospital developments, including the upgrade of the hospital in Mullingar which has been on the cards for many years. The reason given for postponing many of these developments was that the Department of Finance wanted to see a full business case to establish whether the developments represented better value for money than securing the required capacity through the private sector. I heard the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children categorically deny in this House that there was a Government policy to privatise health services. However, the Health Service Executive is now being directed to ensure that such projects are only undertaken by the public sector if the private sector cannot do it. This effectively says that the preferred option for health provision is the private sector. I am seeking a debate on this issue because four major hospital developments, including a dialysis unit in Beaumont Hospital which would provide proper dialysis services, are now postponed indefinitely because the Department of Finance wants to discover if they could be delivered via the private sector. These are all measures which have been announced by the Government and for which the Tánaiste has publicly claimed considerable credit but they are not being carried out because of an ideological determination to hand over the health service to the private sector without any evidence that it would be more effective. We urgently need a debate on this issue before the summer because by the autumn, this ideological drive to privatise the health service will be well nigh irreversible.