Victor Boyhan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I, too, ask for dedicated debate on health. It has become very clear from all the Commencement matters and engagement by Senators on all sides of the House that health is a recurring theme. I request that the Minister - not a Minister of State but the Minister with ultimate responsibility for health - comes to the House. It would be remiss of us to adjourn this summer without a dedicated debate, maybe in three or four modules over a half day or day, on the growing concern over our health services.I respect that Members are in different groupings and parties in the coalition but one thing I can say is there is a genuine concern across all strands of the political groupings in this House. I, therefore, ask that the Minister come to the House. I raised a number of issues, including scoliosis, over a period of months. There has been no progress on these issues. I do not intend to give the Minister a scalding. That is not what I am about. I want constructive debate but I want to look the Minister in the eye where the Leader is now sitting and put a number of questions to him; I would like if that could be taken on board.

I also thank the Senators who were here last night and who engaged in a really positive debate around the Patients Deserve Better campaign. It showed that the House was united. I thank everyone for their contributions. I received an email this morning from one of the members of the campaign who tuned in as they did not attend the debate. We also had visitors in the Public Gallery as well. This person was highly impressed by the fact that it was a cross-party initiative. This says something about this House. We were at our best yesterday so I thank the people who prepared and were involved in that.

From 1 p.m. to 8 p.m. tonight, the Joint Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage will be discussing the general scheme of the Remediation of Dwellings Damaged by the Use of Defective Concrete Blocks Bill 2022. What a national scandal it is. No decision has yet been made about whether there will be pre-legislative scrutiny. This is the committee's attempt to bring these groups from Clare and Donegal and the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage together over a series of modular meetings to discuss it. If anyone has an opportunity to link in or pass on the link to his or her constituents or those who will be interested, I think it will be a lively and interesting debate. A huge number of people will come to the gates of Leinster House regarding this issue in addition to those coming to the meeting. It will be a good meeting but let us not suspend our call for pre-legislative scrutiny at some point on this critical piece of legislation.