Geraldine Feeney (Fianna Fail)

Sometimes when we speak of the national children's hospital we forget that it is not a hospital for Dublin, Kildare and Wicklow, but a national children's hospital. People from as far away as where I live in the north west in Sligo, and those a further 150 miles north on the Inisowen Peninsula, will come down to it. Once we start coming into Dublin, we do not mind whether we are on the northside or southside. It is all the same to us.

Sometimes the debate gets bogged down because everything is centred in Dublin. We do not have a difficulty with that, but people in Dublin should remember that it is for wider use. It will be an all-island hospital, or a 26 county hospital at present, which people in the north west, the south east and the south west will access. It is as easy to go to the Mater Hospital as it would be to go to Tallaght. I thought I heard the Minister state yesterday that it was her understanding that the people in Tallaght Hospital were on board now on the issue of the location of the new hospital.

As I have stated previously in the House, we are giving out an impression. There are people outside of Ireland waiting to come back to take up posts when they become available in the national children's hospital and we need to move on over the issue of location.