Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Unfortunately, I do not agree with the amendment. The discretion has to be left with the Minister in this matter because we are talking about a major change in abolishing the HSE and setting up the new structure. The discretion has to be left with the Minister in regard to putting it in place.

I refer to the negativity about the health care sector. It is interesting to look at the key indicators in regard to health care over the past ten years and I give credit where it is due, including to the previous administration. The media focuses very much on the negatives in the health care sector but the argument I keep putting to people is in regard to maternity care. The number of babies born has gone up from 55,000 to 74,000 per annum. We have one of the lowest perinatal mortality rates in Europe, and long may that continue. Likewise, outpatient attendance has increased from over 2 million per year. The Minister disagreed with me the last day and he had a lower figure but I checked my figures. In 2011, more than 3.5 million people attended outpatient departments. That works out at approximately 37,000 attending Irish hospitals each working day, excluding Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays. That is a huge number.

There are many positives and the EU survey on health care attitudes in Ireland showed that Ireland has the highest percentage of its population in the EU reporting to have good or very good health.

That is an indication of the service that is being provided. There are difficulties in certain areas and there is a need to be far more efficient in respect of the services provided, particularly in trying to eliminate waiting lists. However, that will take time and we must continue working on it. We must bring about the changes needed where deficiencies have been identified in the service. The Minister has done much in the past 18 months. In fairness to the previous Minister and previous Administrations, much good work was done. The major issue was the escalation of costs during that period. Perhaps more should have been done to ensure checks in the system, in particular, where the cost of drugs within the health care sector increased from ¤576 million to ¤1.9 billion. That should not have happened and needs to be addressed. While I agree in principle with Senator Barrett about a timeline, the discretion must be left with the Minister and it is accommodated in section 1.