David Norris (Independent)

I thank my friend and colleague, Senator John Paul Phelan, for so graciously allowing me to take part in this debate. He went right to the heart of the humanity of the matter and I am sure the Minister of State, who also has a warm heart and is a countrywoman, will appreciate these issues. I raised this matter on 17 December and the Minister of State undertook to get back to me. I have no record of her having done so, but perhaps she made an attempt to do so.

There is considerable disinformation about this issue, for which I do not blame the Minister of State. For example, more people have contacted me since I raised the matter, including a man from Scotland whose mother is in this facility. He consulted the website. On the website on 15 January 2009, along with the 2009 national service plan for the Health Service Executive south, there was a note from Gerry O'Dwyer, the network manager, stating: "The report is currently being discussed with a broad range of interested and affected parties and once dialogue is complete the report will be published in full at the end of February or early March this year." That was on the day when this man's mother was told by the matron that the home was closing. He did not even get a telephone call. The website was telling him something completely different. That is not acceptable or professional behaviour.

Imagine how confusing it is for these people. They are being thrown out of their homes because of bureaucratic concern about a building. It is a niggling bureaucratic matter. We are dealing with the lives of real people. Senator John Paul Phelan was absolutely correct when he referred to it as their home. He knows more about this than I do. It is in his patch, he has visited it but I have not had that privilege. He spoke about the way people behave, how all of them get up for their breakfast and several of them could attend the meeting in town, yet they are told they are all bedridden. They are not bedridden, yet they will be bedridden. They have independence in Bethany House but they are going to be put in a hospital where they will be made to go to bed, if they are able to get up, at 6 p.m. They are not given a choice of what they do or what television programs they watch. The Minister of State is a decent woman and this will go to her heart. This would kill them.