The Taoiseach yesterday insisted that the Minister for Defence accepted the Hanly report on the restructuring of the health services. Mr Ahern said no government could bring forward a report on which nobody was entitled to bring forward a view.
"Members here have no idea what the Minister for Defence, Deputy Smith, said on the night and what he said subsequently because they did not even listen to the reports. The Minister totally accepts the Hanly report."
The matter was raised by the Green Party leader, Mr Trevor Sargent, who referred to recent remarks by Mr Smith on the future of Nenagh hospital in his Tipperary North constituency. Mr Smith said on Tuesday: "This is a report, and there is quite a considerable aspect and time lag in terms of its implementation. I will be watching every line of it and nobody is going to take me for granted anywhere."
Amid heated exchanges. Mr Eamon Ryan (Green Party, Dublin South) asked: "What about collective Cabinet responsibility?" Mr John Deasy (FG, Waterford) referring to Mr Smith, who sat on the Government benches, said: "The Taoiseach should look at the Minister's face."
Mr Ahern said that the Government had accepted in principle the core conclusions of the Hanly report that compliance with the European working time directive requires a consultant-provided model of acute service delivery in place of the present largely non-consultant hospital doctor-provided model.
"That is the main decision. A fundamental reorganisation in acute hospital services is required to provide a safe and high quality service for patients.
"The proposed changes must proceed in a way that safeguard the training element of the non-consultant hospital doctors' role and the reforms must be subject to achieving specific changes in non-consultant hospital doctor contracts. We approve the implementation of the report on the lines set out in the Hanly report taking geographics and demographics into consideration."
In further exchanges, Mr Ahern said: "The Minister for Defence, Deputy Smith, and every other Minister accepts that. In the discussion about demographics and geographics, people are entitled to put forward their views. The Minister for Defence totally accepts that."
He hoped, he added, that all members of the Opposition were as wholeheartedly in favour of implementing the report recommendations as the Minister for Defence was.
Mr Sargent said: "I got answers from the Taoiseach, but the Minister for Defence, Deputy Smith, might have to answer for the answers the Taoiseach gave. Does the Cabinet have a collective responsibility any more?" He asked if Mr Smith would get an opportunity to make a statement to the House.
"If we believe the Taoiseach, based on the impression from the newspapers, the Minister was telling big untruths in Tipperary and he does not have a problem with the Hanly report at all. However, the Minister said he did. Will the Taoiseach investigate what the Minister said and will the Taoiseach censure him if he said what he is reported to have said? Or will the Taoiseach just sack him at the next reshuffle? Will there be any honest investigation, or will there be a cloak and dagger change at the next reshuffle?"
Mr Ahern said that the Minister had given his view "on an aspect of the geographics", adding that Mr Smith had made the point that it was not possible to move from an acute hospital to a hospital with no medical service overnight.
