Sean Barrett (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I support the motion and regret the terms of the Government amendment to it. Less than a couple of hours ago, the Minister for Health was impressing Members hugely in this Chamber. It was a great debate in which he thanked Members, they thanked him and a spirit of camaraderie, friendship and so on obtained. He proposed to abolish the Health Service Executive, is working to this end and Members wished him the best of luck.

However, the Government amendment to the motion mentions the Health Service Executive in its first, fifth, seventh and 12th paragraphs. Obviously, whoever wrote this amendment did not listen in to what the Minister, Deputy Reilly, was saying. The many issues the Minister will address include the weakness of financial controls in the health service, which he is reforming. For example, I refer to those people who are called financial officers and accountants who have no qualifications. He is working on such issues and is not relying on the continuation of the Health Service Executive to deliver the health service. Consequently, I do not know the reason the Government amendment relies on it so heavily to dispute the motion tabled by Senators Mary Ann O'Brien and van Turnhout.

I commend the Minister of State for the manner in which she always has thought outside the box when in this Chamber because this is an area Members agree unanimously requires huge reform. A Government economic service is needed for a range of things to ascertain what these numbers look like. As was mentioned, some reports have no numbers and it is necessary to establish the real numbers. This applies regardless of the issue. One might be considering water charges, what the cost of the meter might be or whether it is worth charging some people at all given one would save so little water. Alternatively, one might be ascertaining what is the basis of the household charge, given so many houses are in negative equity, there are so many ghost estates nationwide and so many people remain in houses because banks are trying to hold up the prices. Consequently, such an economic service would be useful throughout the material introduced to this House by the Government. I gather that the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Howlin, who also came into the House today, is considering that.

There is a lot of literature to the effect that people should not be in hospital. As the motion noted, it is extremely expensive and unhealthy and there is an entire literature on iatrogenic diseases. As stated previously, it weakens the relationship between parents and their children. Members also have referred to the findings of the Milliman report that Irish society is hospital-fixated. The aforementioned report on VHI found we keep people in hospital for 10.6 days, whereas best practice worldwide would be 3.7 days. This is eating up money and probably is not doing people much good in terms of health services. If these children can be minded, looked after and loved by their parents, as this motion suggests, let us run with that. Before dealing with some other points, I suggest Members should consider whether the motion tabled by their colleagues meets the spirit of the comments made earlier today by the Minister for Health. I think it does and they should not be sent away rebuked on the basis of a policy that is already changing in the Minister's mind.

When this issue was discussed briefly on the Order of Business, the wish on all sides of the House was to avoid running the debate as a Punch and Judy show after which the newspapers could report, "ashen faced Minister left the House on foot of Government defeat". Members are not doing this and no one wants to do that. They seek to improve policy in a country where so much has gone wrong. While Friday was mentioned as being international children's day, it also will be the fourth anniversary of when bankers walked out of the Department of Finance with ¤64 billion in their pockets. This is the situation with which Members are trying to deal.

During the health debate earlier, Members also pointed out the fastest growing category since 1980, I put the precise numbers on record during that debate, has been the growth of bureaucracy. It has been growing far faster than the number of staff as a whole. This is money that is wasted and which hopefully will be put towards patients in the new Department of Health. The Minister strongly expressed the view that patients be put first. While I support and will be voting for the motion, I echo the point made by Senator Leyden and ask the Government to take on board the sentiments, rather than hitting the motion for six out of the Chamber. Some compromise should be found because all Members are agreed that such children in very great need should be looked after by society. They are much more deserving candidates than running up huge hospital bills or than the bankers who took ¤64 billion from us four years ago or than the rapid expansion of the bureaucracy of the Irish health service. Given her performances in this Chamber and the spirit she brings to debates, I cannot envisage how the Minister of State would vote for the Government amendment.