Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I wish to raise a matter raised previously by Senator Devine, who quoted people incorrectly. It is important to realise that between 22 December 2018 and 2 January 2019, there are 12 days. Seven of those are weekends or public holidays. The issue that arises relates to moving people out of hospital and into step-down facilities. What the Taoiseach was referring to is the fact that many people who are in hospital can be moved to step-down facilities. Last night, I spoke to people involved with Nursing Homes Ireland, NHI, who told me that, in the three-week period from Christmas day, they have very little contact with the HSE or hospitals regarding the taking patients into step-down facilities. I draw attention to work done by NHI as far back as June, July and August in the context of engaging with the unit dealing with the hospitals winter programme. The NHI received a letter on 31 August from the HSE's special delivery unit outlining that, at the emergency department task force meeting on Thursday, 30 August, the agenda for the forum was amended and the NHI presentation was removed from the programme. It is not acceptable that NHI attendance on the day was relegated to a network opportunity and not true collaboration. The NHI represents a sector that is prepared to help deal with hospital overcrowding but it was excluded by the HSE's special delivery unit. I also have before me a letter, dated 31 October 2018, from Ms Anne O'Connor, co-chair of the emergency department task force, and Ms Phil Ní Sheaghdha, head of the INMO, which advises the NHI that its correspondence will be brought to the attention of the emergency department task force for discussion at its next meeting in November. We are talking about correspondence from June, July and August being discussed in November, when we are already into the winter period. The same person from the INMO was on the radio giving out about what the Taoiseach said. The co-chair of the task force is not prepared to engage with the NHI, which is prepared to help deal with hospital overcrowding. This needs to be put on the record and we need to know why the task force is not engaging with NHI and is not prepared to plan for the three-week period in early January in order to take patients out of the hospital sector and make accommodation available to them in step-down facilities where required. We need answers on this issue from the task force. We need to know why it is not engaging with the people who are prepared to provide a service.