Hanly report and hospital waiting lists
Rabbitte challenges the Government’s position on the Hanly report and its waiting-list commitment. The Taoiseach says Hanly remains part of health reform and cites reductions in long waits and patients treated through the national treatment purchase fund.
I too wish to raise the event of the weekend and the political implications arising therefrom. Can we now take it that the Taoiseach has turned his back and walked away from Hanly? He truthfully now, apparently, told the House that the Minister for Defence, Deputy Michael Smith, was right all along and the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Martin, remains wrong. I ask the Taoiseach about the waiting lists and the commitment to which Deputy Kenny has referred, that within two years of 6 May 2002, he would have cleared the waiting lists. Is the Taoiseach still trying to wriggle out of that commitment set out in black and white? Is he now stating, as he stated last Sunday night, that the abolition of the waiting lists will never happen?
Will the Taoiseach explain what his Minister for Finance meant when he said he would bring proposals to Government to control the costs of tribunals. I understand why he might wish to divert attention from the proceedings at certain tribunals but surely this is the same Minister for Finance who cleared the proposal from the then Attorney General, Mr. McDowell, that we increase the allowance to lawyers by €800 per day? What proposals will he bring to Government? Do they involve legislation and when will they be brought before Government?
I ask the Taoiseach about the discovery of €600 million to renovate the Red Cow roundabout and the M50. That proposal has been there since before the Luas works started. The Taoiseach now proposes to embark on a new project that will cause three years of further disruption after the completion of Luas and after the nonsense from the Minister for Transport about putting Luas on stilts has been abandoned.
On the €1 million from the Minister for Social and Family Affairs for families, is this the same woman who took €57 million from the weakest and most vulnerable families in our society with the abolition of the rent subsidy whereby families will be deprived of a roof over their heads? We make a meal of €1 million for families in marginal constituencies, or maybe the same families that will benefit from the €1 million provided by the Minister of State at the Department of Health and Children, Deputy Brian Lenihan. It would not put in two playgrounds in the entire country at a time when there are families who admittedly might never vote, but who are at the very bottom of the ladder, who are being hurt every day by what the Minister, Deputy Mary Coughlan did, the most right-wing Minister we have seen since the Minister, Deputy McCreevy.
Comment on this
The Deputy has asked a range of questions. In the welfare budget we are spending €11.5 billion. They are some of the best and biggest increases ever in various areas of the social welfare budget. Deputy Rabbitte asked whether we have moved away from the Hanly report. The Hanly report is still part of the reform package of the Department of Health and Children. It is claimed that Hanly ignored or placed insufficient emphasis on access to services for patients outside major population areas.
On the matter of the weekend events, I have been listening to some of the arguments of people opposed to Hanly. It is baffling how anyone can suggest that a doubling of consultant numbers and an increase in services in the regions can be seen as a slowing down. I was baffled by that over the weekend. The Hanly report does not recommend centralisation of acute hospital care into a few large hospitals or the downgrading of hospitals——
Comment on this
Hanly argues for the decentralisation of a large proportion of elective acute care and other services currently delivered in large acute hospitals to smaller local hospitals. This means investment in and development of local hospitals.
Comment on this
Some of the issues put forward at the weekend are not true. The claims that some of the Hanly report's conclusions are based on a limited number of sources and that the group misinterpreted their findings, is entirely inaccurate. As I have already said, on the latest figures up to September 2003, there was a 42% reduction in the number of adults on the waiting list for more than 12 months and a 39% reduction in the number of children waiting for more than six months. Over 10,000 patients were treated by the national treatment purchase fund.
