Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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275. To ask the Minister for Health further to an exchange with this Deputy during Leaders' Questions on 8 December 2020, if he has sought clarity on the situation whereby the HSE CervicalCheck programme maintains that the women affected by the CervicalCheck scandal have not been wronged and are merely unfortunate, while the Government is apologising to these women for wrongdoing and the courts are ruling that they have been wronged. [43635/20]

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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276. To ask the Minister for Health further to an exchange with this Deputy during Leaders' Questions on 8 December 2020, if he agrees with the clinical director of CervicalCheck in her contention that the courts are wrong in their rulings that smear tests were read in a manner which was neglectful in respect of the CervicalCheck scandal. [43636/20]

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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283. To ask the Minister for Health his views on the contention of the clinical director of CervicalCheck that the courts are wrong in their rulings that smear tests were read in a manner which was neglectful in respect of the CervicalCheck scandal. [43632/20]

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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284. To ask the Minister for Health if he will clarify the situation whereby the CervicalCheck programme maintains that the women affected by the CervicalCheck scandal have not been wronged and are merely unfortunate, while the Government is apologising to these women for wrongdoing and the courts are ruling that they have been wronged; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [43633/20]

Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 275, 276, 283 and 284 together.

The HSE has confirmed that CervicalCheck is not in opposition to the actions of the Supreme Court or of the Government.

The HSE, National Screening Service (NSS) and CervicalCheck programme have been recently communicating about the contents and recommendations of Expert Reference Groups’ (ERG) reports, which were published by the HSE on 21st October 2020, and which set out the future framework for clinical audit of interval cancers in our cancer screening programmes (CervicalCheck, BreastCheck and BowelScreen).

These reports were commissioned by the HSE in line with recommendations in the Scally Scoping Inquiry, and the full reports are available on the HSE website.

As Minister for Health, my priority is to continue the work to restore the CervicalCheck screening programme as a leading international cancer screening programme, to improve public trust and confidence in screening, and further the global aim to eradicate cervical cancer.