Brendan Ryan (Labour)

I want to raise the shocking news that 52 beds in Beaumont Hospital are to be closed over the next two weeks, which Senator Quinn referred to earlier. At the end of this week, 33 beds are to go with a further 19 in two weeks' time. This is down to Beaumont's budget being slashed by €19 million by the HSE.

According to the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation on Thursday last, 42 patients were on trolleys, 38 on Friday, 32 this Tuesday and 50 yesterday. Many of these patients, some of them elderly, did not even have a trolley and were forced to sit on chairs. Several weeks ago, a friend of mine had to spend 24 hours sitting upright on a chair with no facility to sleep and a drip hanging from his arm. This is the reality of Beaumont Hospital's accident and emergency department. People are held up in the department because of a lack of bed availability in the general hospital. This is before the 52-bed cut will come into play. I have been informed by nurses at the hospital that these cuts will devastate the accident and emergency department. A health strategy based on starvation of resources, slash-and-burn or sink-and-swim approaches is unacceptable. The approach may be acceptable in some organisations but it certainly has no place in a hospital. For each of the 52 beds that are to be closed there will be 52 fewer beds available to relieve the position.

More of the same cutbacks is the health strategy of this Government. It cuts the budget without any concern for the effect on the patient. That is unacceptable. I ask the Leader to convey the message to the Minister that she should personally intervene to ensure these bed closures do not take place tomorrow. We need an improvement in accident and emergency services in Beaumont Hospital, not the deterioration that will be the result of these cutbacks.