Clare Daly (Dublin North, Socialist Party)
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205. To ask the Minister for Health if he will clarify the consultation process between his Department and the general public in relation to the advance health care directives and the new capacity legislation. [12284/14]

James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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On Tuesday 4 February 2014, the Government approved the publication of the draft General Scheme of the advance healthcare directive provisions for the purposes of a public consultation. The consultation process ran from Tuesday 4 February until Friday 7 March 2014. As of Monday 10 February the Department had received a total of 55 submissions to the consultation. The Department wished to have views on the draft General Scheme and welcomed the comments of individuals, institutions, agencies, organisations, and groups on the issue. The Department placed advertisements in the national press on Thursday 6 February requesting written submissions to the consultation and a press release relating to the consultation was also circulated to media outlets. A number of stakeholder organisations representing a range of different fields (e.g. medicine, law, health advocacy, disability, mental health, and older people and aging) were contacted directly and invited to make a submission to the consultation.

The Department established a dedicated webpage for this consultation process (). This webpage provided an overview of the consultation process, including a copy of the draft General Scheme of the advance healthcare directive provisions and a discussion document which summarised the draft General Scheme and outlined some structured questions to help interested parties focus their submissions. Submissions could be returned by post, to the Bioethics Unit in the Department, or via email to the dedicated email address set up for the consultation: . The Department will publish a summary of the submissions received as part of this public consultation on its website in the coming months.

In addition, during the period of the consultation process, the Irish Hospice Foundation’s Forum on End of Life in Ireland held a public meeting in relation to the draft General Scheme on Thursday 27 February. The Department’s Chief Bioethics Officer gave a presentation at this event and provided an overview of the draft legislative provisions for advance healthcare directives. Following the consultation process the advance healthcare directive provisions are to be incorporated into the Assisted Decision-Making (Capacity) Bill at Committee Stage, in line with a Government decision from 2013. It is envisaged that the Bill will be brought to Committee Stage in the coming months.