Phil Prendergast (Labour)

Will the Leader ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs to clarify the status of the back to school allowance scheme? I have been inundated with questions from parents about when the application forms will be available and whether the allowance will be paid in time.

Recently, the transfer of a severely ill patient from Clonmel hospital to the Mater Hospital in Dublin could not go ahead, not because a bed was unavailable but because the hospital was depending on a pool of ambulances serving all Dublin hospitals. Therefore, a patient who no longer required the high-dependency bed in the centre of excellence could not be moved to allow this severely ill patient to avail of the bed. Surely it is not too much to ask that a hospital designated as a centre of excellence would have its own dedicated ambulance service. When the Minister for Health and Children addresses this issue, perhaps she could also address the issue of an ambulance service for Carrick-on-Suir.