John Gilroy (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State to the Chamber. I am glad to see her here again. No one in this Chamber or outside would ever doubt her commitment to reform of the mental health services.

I will take a look at the historical or legacy obstacles that face us to put in context some of the challenges with which we are faced in the mental health services, both child and adolescent services and adult services. More than 30 years ago, as a young student nurse I walked into a mental hospital in Cork where 1,000 patients were living in Dickensian conditions. They were segregated, between male and female, and never the twain would meet. Male nurses looked after male patients and female nurses looked after female patients, and the level of abnormality was only compounded in that situation. Over the years, the system has gradually and achingly changed.

Before 1984, in Cork, in the same hospital I was working in, there was a child and adolescent unit on the campus of St. Stephen's Hospital which had a complement of 20 inpatient beds. We closed that unit in St. Stephen's Hospital in Cork and we did not replace it with any beds until five or six years ago when we opened eight temporary beds, also on the campus of St. Stephen's. We closed those because they were temporary and we built a special unit for the purpose on the grounds of Bessborough. Now we have eight beds there. I am not even sure how that is working.