Ulick Burke (Fine Gael)

It is unfortunate that the Minister for Health and Children came to the House and delivered the usual jargon. However, it is clear from what she said that the Government has abdicated its responsibility in tackling this urgent and infectious outbreak in our hospitals. The Minister said she reaffirmed Ireland's commitment to enhancing the safety of patients by signing a global patient safety challenge. That indicates her complete misunderstanding of the reality. There is something wrong in the hospitals and she has failed to take action. She must take responsibility because the HSE is not doing its work.

To blame nurses for the lack of cleanliness in hospitals is wrong. The nurses have a professional duty and they carry that out to the highest standards possible. She spoke about national initiatives in her speech. What are they? She mentioned a public education programme, initiatives in appropriate prescribing of antibiotics, national surveillance and health care worker education and training programmes. That would be fine if we were not dealing with something that needs immediate action. She also failed to point out that she is not providing the funding for the cleaning of hospitals. If we had clean hospitals like those of 30 or 40 years ago when we did not have this problem, it might then be fine to suggest those initiatives to deal with problems that may occur in the future. However, she has failed to realise that the infection is rampant in our hospitals. Many patients who leave hospital go to other care facilities such as nursing homes and they are now being infected.

As long as this Minister believes that training programmes can solve the problem without an urgent cleaning of hospitals, then the infections will continue. I could show Members of this House a photograph of a ward in University College Hospital in Galway. This 26-bed ward has a chain and a padlock on the door from Friday evening to Monday morning, yet we are still told there are no facilities for the isolation of patients with the MRSA infection. This is occurring all year round. I monitored the situation for six weeks as I was visiting someone regularly in the hospital. Each Friday evening, a lock and a chain was put on that facility. I was told it was locked because there are six day care beds in that facility. That is not the case.

We were always told that when the nuns ran the hospitals there was never a dirty ward, which is true to some extent. When a matron went around the wards every day, we did not have these problems. Practical steps are needed, as are resources.

I am sure the Minister is getting consultants to prepare a glossy magazine that will outline the HSE's new initiatives in the western region and other areas. The glossy magazine will provide details of the HSE's initiatives. Hundreds of thousands of euro will be used to pay consultants and to produce the glossy magazine that will lie on a shelf or be dumped in a bin, without any notice being taken of it. If such resources were used to do certain jobs, we would have a better service.

My colleagues have cited figures which underline the increases in the incidence of MRSA. The tragedy is that many people have died. A support group has been established to help the families who have been affected by MRSA. The group is begging the Minister to acknowledge the extent of this crisis. Her comments in this House indicate clearly that she does not understand the problem. She does not want to interfere other than to express her sentiments in the form of jargon.

It seems that no individual is ultimately responsible for the hygiene level in a given hospital. We will not make progress until somebody with the appropriate responsibility gets somebody in to solve the problem. We have heard on many occasions about the problems in one of the main hospitals in Dublin. We have seen headlines to that effect in the national newspapers. A patient in that hospital had to take the initiative to highlight what she encountered there. She spoke about the dirt and grime in the hospital's toilets and other facilities. There is no need for me to say anything further about it.

Who will take responsibility for this problem? I do not think it is the duty of nurses because they are professional people who need to concentrate on bringing patients to good health once more. Somebody else needs to be responsible. Some officials from the HSE's western division spoke this morning about what they intend to do. They gave a list of people with responsibilities in various areas. The same sentiments were expressed by public representatives across the board, without political distinction. It was agreed that nobody was taking responsibility for the delivery of the service.

I am sure Senators Glynn and Leyden, as former members of health boards, will agree that if these problems had been encountered when the health board structure was still in place, the public representatives who were members of the boards would have taken the initiative and highlighted the matter at local level. That opportunity is now gone, however. This problem would not have deteriorated to the current extent if the health boards were still in existence. Somebody within that structure was always prepared to take responsibility at local level.