The Minister for Health hit out at the Opposition parties as he defended the Government's healthcare-reform plans. Marie O'Halloran reports.
Mr Martin said: "Under the leadership of Enda Kenny and Pat Rabbitte, Fine Gael and Labour have become policy-free zones. They've stopped the publication of detailed alternative budgets because they would have to explain everything."
They had "joined the Greens and Sinn Féin in the 'promise everything to everyone club'."
As the local elections effectively got under way, the Minister highlighted reforms such as the smoking ban. He said the ban would make Leinster House "a smoke-free workplace, but as long as we have the Opposition it will always be full of hot air".
On the Hanly hospital-reform proposals, he stressed that local hospitals and their communities "will play a full part in deciding their future and, at a very minimum, that future will protect on-site, 24-hour medical cover".
In the Mid-West region alone, there would be a doubling of the number of consultants from 100.
During a question-and-answer session on health, Mr Joe Neville, of the trade union Mandate, asked who was going to implement the smoking ban, how was it going to be implemented and how effective it would be.
The Minister replied that the "emphasis will be on building up compliance" but said that there were 400 environmental-health officers. Some 46 of those would be working exclusively on the smoking ban, but all would be working with employers to build up compliance.
Ms Anne Fitzgerald, from Tipperary North, asked who the chief executive of the Mid-Western Health Board was answerable to "when he makes a bad decision". She said there were 40 children in Templemore, 80 in Thurles and 100 in Roscrea in need of speech therapy.
A speech therapist had been in place but was moved by the chief executive and had not been replaced. The Minister said the chief executive was answerable to his or her board. Authority was deferred to the health boards. "That's the bottom line in the culpability chain," he added.