There were rowdy scenes in the Dáil and the House was suspended this morning amid repeated Opposition demands for a debate to clarify reports that there were thousands of unopened referral letters from GPs to consultants at Tallaght hospital.
But Tánaiste Mary Coughlan said some of the facts “are being disputed”. She said all the issues were under investigation and the hospital’s chief executive officer was meeting the Department of Health today to discuss the matters involved.
She insisted, to repeated interruptions and heckling: “We will await the outcome of the investigation, so that we can support the facts.”
There were calls for Minister for Health Mary Harney to be recalled from New Zealand and Sinn Féin Dáil leader Caoimhgin Ó Caoláin challenged Fine Gael and Labour to cancel the “pairing” arrangement for the Minister, whereby a member of the Opposition refrains from voting to balance the absence of a member of Government away on official business.
Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny described the revelations as the “latest catastrophe in health”. Mr Kenny said that these referrals “may in fact refer to much more serious or prevalent conditions for many people”, and he demanded that the House sit later this evening for a debate on this issue.
He pointed out that Ms Harney was not returning from New Zealand until March 22nd. “This is another catastrophe”, Mr Kenny said. It was the “ultimate classic example of lack of accountability in this House. This is hands off Government," he said adding that the party would move a motion of no confidence in the Minister if the Taoiseach reappointed her to the department of Health.
The Government rejected calls for the House either to debate the issue this evening or to return next week for a debate. The Dáil adjourns today until March 23rd, and Labour leader Eamon Gilmore said that while it was reasonable that Government ministers represented the State abroad, he described Ms Harney’s trip to New Zealand as an “abuse”.
He said: "We now have one minister who's on a visit to New Zealand for two weeks on an itinerary…. that reads more like the Lord of the Rings trail.
"The only thing missing from it is an invitation for dinner hosted by Bilbo Baggins. And meanwhile the health service for which she is responsible for is falling apart.”
Mr Gilmore also said “people go to their doctor, their doctor refers them to a hospital and the hospital doesn’t even open the letter. And even when they do get the X-rays, the consultant radiologists doesn’t even see the X-rays and there are 14,000 patients whose X-rays have still not been looked by a consultant radiologist”.
Mr Ó Caoláin called for the Dáil to sit next week and said the problems were not confined to one hospital. “It beggars belief that Tallaght is a unique aberration,” he said, and that other hospitals did not have similar situation.