I was recently informed by the HSE that in CHO 7, which includes my constituency, Dublin South-West, the waiting time for speech and language therapy was at 38 months. Occupational therapy was at 27 months and a psychological assessment was 32 months. The Tánaiste will probably recall that I raised this issue in the previous Dáil and in this Dáil. We appear to have a broken system with regard to speech and language therapy in CHO 7. In the last Dáil, I was told that key personnel were missing and so on. Is the Tánaiste aware of the situation? Can he find out what is the problem? Does he accept that a 38-month wait for speech and language therapy for any child is unacceptable? People are being forced to go to court to get assessments. This is totally unacceptable.

The Tánaiste said in response to a previous question that he is concerned about the ownership of the land for the new national maternity hospital and so am I. He said he is concerned about governance issues and so am I. We both want a resolution. He mentioned the gifting of the land to the State. Why is that not an option or solution? If the Religious Sisters of Charity are prepared to set up a private company with a 99 year lease, because they say they want a completely hands-off approach, then why not gift the land to the State? Has that been sought? What is the impediment? Surely that is the obvious solution. There will a protest outside the Dáil next Saturday. How can we get a resolution to this? There is a seemingly obvious resolution of gifting the land to the State.

I acknowledge that the waiting times for therapies are very long and far too long in many parts of the country. Although I may be incorrect, I think that CHO 7 was part of a pilot where we are going to move therapists into schools, which we think might be a more effective way of providing these services than through the HSE. I will seek an update on that and come back to Deputy Crowe about it.

In response to Deputy Cullinane, the Government and people of Ireland recognise and appreciate the phenomenal work that the Religious Sisters of Charity have done over the years in providing healthcare and education when the State did not. Bad things happened too and they were absolutely wrong, but we should not lose sight of the good things that happened. They are proposing to gift the land to a charity, not to the State or the people. We would much prefer that it be gifted to the State, to the people, in that way. We would even be willing to purchase it because that would be a better option too. However, it is complicated. It is on the site of another hospital which is a voluntary hospital and not a State-owned hospital. We need to work it out. Let me say very clearly that it is the absolute view of the Government that it has to be 100% clear, and legally clear, that all procedures lawful in the State should be performed in that hospital. We also need to get the governance and ownership right.