I thank the Taoiseach for the reply. We have been living on promises for a long time. When the Taoiseach says that he and this one and that one are going to do something, it will be after the election. We will have to wait to see who is there. When is the Government going to react and lift the embargo? The facts are that day after day, young boys and girls who are trained to be nurses, carers and GPs are leaving the country because there has been an embargo in place for 12 months, since last November. The Taoiseach cannot deny it. It has happened and is happening. So many posts are unfilled and so many beds are empty because you cannot have beds if you do not have staff to fill them. That is what is happening. Even as we speak, these young people are flying out. We are calling for beds. There was not even an ICU bed to be got yesterday in most of the country, except for up here in Dublin. The Minister, Deputy Donnelly, said he had reduced the waiting time for cataract procedures from three years to three months in Dublin. What has the Government done in Kerry? It closed down our unit and cancelled the insurance so they could not act. It was utterly criminal. That is the gospel truth.

The Deputy is right that there was a period during the year where we had to put restrictions on hiring new posts in the health service because many more thousands of people had been hired than had been budgeted for.

The restrictions are still there.

We worked our way through that, and there are lots more people working in the public health service now, including in Kerry. There are around 410 additional staff in Kerry hospital today. I think there has been an increase of around 177 nurses in the lifetime of this Government. When it comes to reducing wait times we are making progress. We are one of the few countries in Europe that has seen waiting times fall over the past two years. That fall has happened in Kerry too. Let me assure the Deputy. The waiting time-----

People cannot get a doctor.

-----for cataract procedures in Kerry has fallen this year compared with last year.

That is because we have taken them on buses.

No, you know why it is-----

One after the other - 165 buses and 2,000 people and nothing for us.

Thank you, Deputy.

What did the Government do for them? It closed down the unit in Tralee. That is what it did.

You would swear the Deputy was paying for the bus. The reality is that we are reducing wait times. We have opened up more ophthalmology capacity in the south west. The Deputy has pointed to additional capacity that exists in this jurisdiction that does not require anyone to be brought out of the jurisdiction. We will continue to do more to drive down waiting times.