I offer my good wishes given the day that is in it. They will probably be a bit superfluous to requirements since there is already so much love in the Chamber between the two parties of Government. In the wake of the CervicalCheck scandal, the buzz word about this place was "confidence". However, the revelations of the past few days regarding cervical screening do nothing but undermine confidence in a system that can barely afford further controversy. The Tánaiste should not take my word for it. The Irish Cancer Society has expressed worry about the delays. At a meeting of the Joint Committee on Health yesterday, officials from the Department of Health said that no capacity analysis had been conducted regarding the ability of the CervicalCheck programme to carry out extra smear tests once the free tests had been announced by the Minister in April 2018.

This has resulted in a backlog of 78,000 tests and in some women waiting up to 27 weeks for their results. Imagine that wait. It is disgraceful.

I happen to believe that offering free tests to women who wanted them, given the calamity we witnessed last year in respect of CervicalCheck, was the right thing to do but the Minister should have ensured that the capacity was there to deliver. It is patently clear now he did not do that. It is yet another shocking example of the shambles of a system this Minister presides over and it is further evidence that he is not up to the job of leading our health service.

Given the scale of the CervicalCheck crisis, the very first thing the Minister should have done before offering free smear tests was to make absolutely certain that the volume of additional tests could be dealt with within the medically indicated timeframe. The position of the Department of Health is that it was impossible to quantify the uptake in respect of repeat smear tests. This is nonsense. It is a relatively recent scandal. I am sure the Tánaiste will recall the public outcry and the interest in this subject at the time, so it is little wonder that 90,000 women availed of the offer of a free repeat test. We all now know about the Jade Goody effect, which, in 2009, gave rise to an increase in the number of women seeking tests in the wake of the death of that young woman. It is no wonder that it happened here. In fact, it is entirely predictable that it would happen here. However, what we got instead was a soundbite when no work had been done in advance.

We need to be able to trust the Minister for Health, the Department of Health and the HSE to respond appropriately and intelligently in a crisis. What work was undertaken since these backlogs were reported as far back as August of last year? Why has the backlog grown so continuously almost month on month? Is it the case that no effective action was taken? If action was taken, why are these actions not working to reduce the waiting times? Furthermore, what work is being undertaken at this time to ensure this backlog is cleared urgently and that tests are carried out within a recommended timeframe? What is the new revised deadline for the roll-out of the HPV test since two deadlines have already been missed?

The Deputy is right in one thing - the CervicalCheck screening process does not need another controversy. It has been a real challenge for the Government, the Department of Health and the HSE to deal with what was an extraordinary scandal a little less than a year ago. At all times, the Minister and the Government have responded in a way that has tried to put women's interests first. I am glad that it was confirmed at the health committee yesterday that the Minister, unlike what has been stated by some in this House, was not advised by his officials not to proceed with-----

I did not say that.

That was not the case the Deputy made but it was a charge the leader of Fianna Fáil made this week.

The Minister was not advised by his officials not to provide free out-of-cycle tests for women on a temporary basis in order to try to provide confidence and reassurance. That is what happened. Undoubtedly, the response to that, as the Deputy has outlined, was significant as people sought reassurance, and that has put more pressure on the system. The HSE and the Department of Health are responding to that by looking for increased lab capacity to be able to deal with that significant increase, which is a combination, by the way, not just of an increase as a result of out-of-cycle free smear tests on the advice of GPs but also an increased uptake of the test generally. Therefore, the system has been put under a lot of extra strain. It is not easy to put expanded or new contracts in place with the labs concerned. What the HSE is now doing is prioritising the stabilising of CervicalCheck to get us back to where we should be, which is between four to six weeks of a wait as opposed to 24 to 26 weeks, which is not acceptable. That needs to be and is the priority now. The way in which we are responding to that is to look for and source increased capacity so we can get these waiting times down.

In the context of the switch to HPV testing, we are committed to this and international best practice would support that decision. Some countries have already moved to HPV testing but Ireland will be one of the first movers. We have committed in this year's budget to facilitating that transition and the preparation and scoping that is necessary to do that efficiently is under way. We also have to factor in the need to prioritise the stabilisation of the existing screening process, which we are doing. I am not in a position to give the Deputy an exact date. Those questions were asked yesterday at the health committee. As soon as we have a date we can commit to, of course, we will inform the House straight away.

I am a woman who uses that service. I can say on my behalf and on that of women I have spoken to that the Tánaiste is not filling me with any confidence. The wait time is now 27 weeks, which, as the Tánaiste stated, is not acceptable. The shaking heads, sighing, shrugging and all of that is not going to help. I asked him what concrete steps are being taken. In advance of making the offer, it is now clear that no steps were taken to ensure there was additional capacity despite the fact the need for additional capacity was absolutely predictable. We got a soundbite but no homework done in advance and no follow-up work done to date. There is no date for the HPV testing and, again, that has been long-fingered. It is another issue of women's health that has been put on the back-burner, which is not acceptable.

On the news yesterday, we saw a young woman who is waiting for the return of her test results. She was told that had she had the capacity to pay, it would have been turned around in two weeks. Is the Government doing anything concrete to ensure that this backlog is cleared as a matter of urgency and priority? What does the Tánaiste say to those women who have not jumped the two-tier recovery bus and who do not have the money to go private and jump the queue?

The introduction of HPV testing is not being long-fingered but it is going to be done properly in order to ensure that transition works and that we do not add any further uncertainty in regard to CervicalCheck in the future. This decision is not going to be rushed. The work is already under way to make sure this transition happens in a way that is seamless and that works. We are not in a position to give an exact date as to when that will happen. We are in a position to say the money is there to do that this year, and there is a process under way and a team working on that to make sure it is done.

What we are doing to focus on a backlog and waiting times that are far too long is to increase capacity, where that is possible. It is not a straightforward thing to increase lab capacity overnight. Decisions had to be made in response to what was a crisis at the time, where-----

It was a soundbite.

It was not a soundbite. Some 90,000 women-----

It was a soundbite. None of the work was done in advance.

The Deputy stated that 90,000 women availed of that out-of-cycle smear test.

And 78,000 of them are waiting.

That is not as a result of a soundbite. That is as a result of a service that was being provided by GPs. That has put pressure-----

It was not delivered.

There are 78,000 of them waiting.

If the Deputy is not going to listen-----

The Minister is not answering the question.

Order, please, Deputy O'Reilly.

That was a real commitment which resulted in real demand and real tests. It put the lab system under pressure and that has resulted in a delay in the turnaround times. We know that. The priority is to get those times down, which is what the HSE is focusing on.