Rose Conway Walsh (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We are awaiting the result of the vote this evening in the House of Commons at Westminster on the latest Brexit debacle. It is astounding to learn that the British Prime Minister never sought agreement or consulted the UK Attorney General before she went to the European Union for the latest round of attempts to secure agreement. We need to be very mindful that there will be no good Brexit for the island of Ireland and that the people of the North voted against it. They do not want it. Therefore, we must ensure there will be no return to a hard border on the island of Ireland and no undermining of the Good Friday Agreement. That has been our bottom line from day one. It is what Sinn Féin has sought to achieve. The backstop, as contained in the withdrawal agreement, is the only way to legally guarantee that outcome. Sinn Féin will seek confirmation from the Taoiseach in the Dáil today and this House that the withdrawal agreement and the backstop have not been diminished or diluted in any way. That is of huge importance to the whole island.

I highlight information we have gathered on the staffing of primary care centres and especially the number of centres throughout the State that do not have a GP. Let us take County Mayo as an example. There is no GP in the primary care centres in Ballinrobe and Claremorris. In the primary care centre in Castlebar there is only 0.06 of a physiotherapist, whatever that is supposed to mean. There are no psychologists in the centre in Ballinrobe. My point is that all of the investment in primary care centres is of no use whatsoever if we do not have the staff to serve the communities in which they are located. If there is a huge primary care centre and no GP, one might well ask what is the point in having it.The Minister for Health needs to consider how that feeds into the acute hospitals such as Mayo University Hospital in respect of numbers of people waiting on trolleys or in the emergency department at any given time, to ensure that the primary care centres are fully staffed, as they need to be. Mayo has 0.06 of a physiotherapist and hundreds of people, including children with disabilities, waiting for physiotherapy in the county and other counties. That is not acceptable. There needs to be investment in the personnel in primary care centres as well as investment in the infrastructure. I ask that the Minister come to the House after the St. Patrick's Day break to tell us his plans to fully staff have these centres. It is a serious problem where we do not have general GPs. Areas such as Bangor Erris in Mayo does not have a permanent GP service and this cannot be allowed to continue because people's lives and health are at risk where we do not have proper primary care GP services.