Joanne Collins (Sinn Fein)

My thoughts go out to all the families in the mid-west who have unnecessarily lost loved ones due to the clear failures of our health service in the region. I commend the staff of UHL. They get up every day and go to work in what can sometimes only be considered a warzone. They have talked about the stress they are under and about feeling that staff in the mid-west are not being seen. I thank the Minister for giving up her time for that meeting yesterday. I apologise that I had to leave early but I did catch up with my colleagues afterwards. I was a bit confused when I saw some of the headlines coming out reporting that some of our colleagues in the Dáil were saying that we were going to get a second hospital in the mid-west. What I got from the meeting was that we were getting options A and B and that, after Christmas, the Minister might look at option C. I just do not think she gets how serious this is. I could be wrong.

I will go into some of the history, as my colleague did before me. Nearly 16 years ago, Fianna Fáil shut down three emergency departments in the area, those in Ennis and Nenagh and the one at St. John's Hospital. That Government promised we would get a centre of excellence. Between them, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil have been in power, on and off, for the past 15 years and nothing has happened. We are getting 96-bed blocks and 16 beds here and there, but it is not good enough. The next 96-bed block is not going to be built until 2029. That is another three years. How many more lives do we have to lose in the mid-west before something is done to move this on a little bit more quickly?