John Crown (Independent)

I would be grateful if the Leader could find out from the Minister for Health if it would be possible to clarify the lead up to, the circumstances of, and the implementation of a decision to bring in a firm of private management consultants to run the hospital services in Galway and Limerick. This is a fundamental shift in the way a large part of the acute hospital service will be run and co-ordinated. I have a perspective on this and would be anxious to have the opportunity to discuss it with the Minister, if possible. In a few months it will be the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic. The Titanic analogies are done to death when discussing the health service, but in the health service geographical area in question where the waiting list for some outpatient appointments can be up to two years and which is desperately short of all the specialists needed to implement the services, the idea that the right way to fix the system is to bring in more managers is similar to bringing in a new organisation of coxswains on the sinking Titanic to man the few lifeboats that remain to ensure that the 700 rather than the 2,200 patients can access lifeboats in an orderly fashion.

Clearly, a more fundamental shift is necessary in how the health system is run, managed and led. I ask the Minister to consider the possibility that, perhaps, what is needed is not new management, but new leadership. We must develop a new culture of leadership with professional technical management, rather than having a culture where, in a leadership vacuum, the leadership is provided by technical managers who do not have the vision of what the health service should be. I do not believe the new managers coming in, although I wish them well in their thankless task, will necessarily bring the skill set that is required. We need something much more fundamental.