Marc MacSharry (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister to the House and I also welcome those in the Visitors Gallery and thank them for taking the time to come to listen to the debate.

I will be opposing the motion. To clarify that, since September last I have probably been the most consistent speaker on this issue. I have had two motions on the Adjournment on the issue which have been specific to Sligo and that region. I am a supporter of the Government strategy in general in the context of developing specialist centres throughout our nation and I acknowledge Professor Keane's expertise in that regard. I obviously differ, as the Minister well knows, on a variety of points, to some of which I will refer during my contribution.

A strategy for cancer control in Ireland states: "Ireland will have a network of equitably accessible state-of-the-art cancer treatment facilities and we will become an internationally recognised location for education and research into all aspects of cancer." I am holding a map of Ireland which apparently shows a network of equitably accessible facilities. It speaks for itself. North of a line from Dublin to Galway, there will be no centre of excellence. That is simply unacceptable to the people of the north-west region. There is no situation in which we can call no representation in the northern half of the country equitably accessible. It is unacceptable to me that any aspiration would exist to have the National Health Service supply the health service to the north west of this country.

There are a number of reasons the debate over the past year has taken a number of different turns. I do not accept there is no case based on facts. This is not some local politician interested in having a rant on behalf of some glorified local nursing home in the north west. I consider myself a citizen of the north west and I believe the north west is entitled to representation in the provision of equitably accessible services. This is based on fact, not on aspiration or any political situation because this is an issue of human importance. There is a human aspect to this which must be considered.

I fully support the concept of specialist centres because they will lead to better outcomes in due course. However, if we are to purport to design a programme which acknowledges this is the case, then we must examine the statistics, even if those statistics come from the HSE, laundered through public relations companies or otherwise. Based on the national cancer registry from 1994 to 2001, cancer sufferers in the north west region had a 25% lower chance of survival. However, that is an incorrect statement. When one examines the figures more closely, one sees that the figure is 123% less 100%, which is actually 23%. In the western health board region, which includes Galway where the proposed centre of excellence will be located, the figure is 26%. The north western region was no worse than the west. However, an interesting fact to which I have never heard anyone in the HSE refer is that, according to the same document, when the fully adjusted model is taken into account, survival rates in the north west are only 7% lower than those in the eastern region. At the same time, in the western region, including Galway, the figure is 26%.

Those figures are completely out of date, as we all well know. They predate the development of Sligo Regional Hospital, based in Sligo, which is a gateway centre under the national spatial strategy and the largest urban centre in that part of the country, north of the line from Dublin to Galway. They also predate the appointment of a medical oncologist, an excellent surgeon, Dr. Tim O'Hanrahan and a multidisciplinary team in 2001, as advocated under the report of 2000 by Professor Niall O'Higgins. Nobody from the HSE is prepared to engage with the professionals on the ground until they are, in their words, prepared to "submit" and at that point, Professor Keane has told the authorities in the regional hospital representing the north west——