Alan Kelly (Labour)

Being consistent with what I said last week, I, too, would welcome a debate on the economy. It is necessary that it take place prior to the recess.

The figures released since we last met are startling. We knew that housing output would be one third of what it was last year. People have mortgages, yet rates have increased to6%. People with young families are finding it tight in terms of managing their finances. They are suffering.

We need to debate this issue. We need to come up not only with words but solutions and to offer some advice to the Government who have mishandled this area and have done so for many years. I have said on record previously that the current Taoiseach has been responsible for the turnaround in the economy.

I want to raise an issue I have raised previously, that of not only how the Department of Health and Children works with the HSE but how the HSE conducts its affairs separate from the way outlined in its strategy. On a number of occasions I have referred to the requirement to publish the Teamwork report into acute services, especially as it affects the north west. I have even submitted FOI requests on it or similar reports but have received no response. Yet to my amazement, I found the basic tenets of this report contained in an e-mail. This is the way the HSE decides to run its affairs. It is spin after spin. One can take my word, these e-mails are real. Reports are emanating from meetings with Professor Drumm in which he is telling hospital managers what is happening to their future, without ever saying so publicly. I have seen these reports and e-mails in which he has made decisions about acute care, particularly in the mid west, and the effect they will have on Nenagh General Hospital, Ennis General Hospital and the mid west general hospital in Dooradoyle, Limerick. Acute services will be cut from Nenagh General Hospital and the accident and emergency department and care of the elderly will be affected. We can have an argument about this issue. We can discuss it and disagree on it, and I vehemently disagree, but at least he should say so publicly.

The Teamwork report was meant to be published in February, March and April but has not yet been published. Yet I can receive its contents in an e-mail. Many politicians in the mid west have seen this e-mail. This is ridiculous and it has to stop. The HSE cannot run its affairs by spin which is what it is doing. I ask the Leader to approach the Minister and the Taoiseach in regard to this matter. This issue has gone on for too long. Let Professor Drumm announce his strategies and go public on them and let us have real debate rather than this drip feed of information that has continued for far too long.