Alex White (Dublin South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

-----and no serious argument has been advanced. In any case, Ireland is legally obliged to transpose the EU directive into Irish law, and we would face sanctions if we failed to do so.

I accept that the current infrastructure for organ donation and transplantation in Ireland can be improved. However, I firmly believe that this infrastructure must be built on a solid foundation of quality and safety. The regulations facilitate that.

Every effort must continue to be made to increase organ donation rates and to enhance our transplantation system. The Health Service Executive's National Organ Donation and Transplantation Office is playing a lead role in determining practices and organisational changes that will further improve donation rates in this country.

Ireland, working with its EU counterparts in line with the EU action plan, will continue to develop strategies and practices aimed at optimising outcomes of the organ donation and transplantation system. This will include deployment of donor co-ordinators, increased living donation, and a change to the current consent system. The ultimate goal is to save lives and improve the quality of life of transplant recipients.

The HSE is working to assign donor co-ordinators across the hospital system. A number of Members raised that issue and I assure them that is being addressed. This is an administrative process independent of the EU directive, and so much of what has been argued for and advocated in the debate are not matters that arise from the directive. These are broader policy issues the Members are properly raising and urging on the Government to advance. I have no difficulty with the Members raising those questions and seeking to pursue them but they are not matters that are germane to the substance of the directive, which is what the Senators are asking to have annulled.

The directive specifically provides that member states may designate one or more competent authorities. This is an issue that was raised by the Members in regard to the directive. In an Irish context, the Government believes it is entirely appropriate to assign competent authority functions between the Irish Medicines Board and the Health Service Executive. It is wrong for anybody to seek to invoke the terms of the directive to justify suggesting that we were not faithful to the directive in regard to the regulations. Point (24) of the preamble to the directive states that the member states should have a key role to play and so on. It goes on to state:

As emphasised by the Recommendation ... of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe to Member States on the background ... it is preferable to have a single non-profit making body which is officially recognised with overall responsibility for donation, allocation, traceability and accountability. However ...

The two or three Members who raised this earlier should have quoted the text after "However". It is interesting the way people selectively quote matters. It goes on to state:

However, depending especially on the division of competences within the Member States, a combination of local, regional, national and/or international bodies may work together to coordinate donation, allocation and/or transplantation, provided that the framework in place ensures accountability, cooperation and efficiency.

There is nothing in the directive of that kind and it is wrong to suggest that there is.