Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

To follow up on what was said about radiation services, the last time we had a group from the HSE and the Department before the committee, I raised the issue of a child with scoliosis who was in Crumlin hospital. The child was there a number of weeks in Crumlin hospital with the parents sharing the room with two other children because they could not get an MRI. Thankfully, the child has got that MRI. There were other difficulties in that case as well. An anaesthetist was needed because of the pain the child was going through. That puts things in context.

Ms Kelleher mentioned machines being down. When I was getting radiation, in a lot of cases, there was a machine on standby because of breakages and everything else. Will she tell the committee where those machines are not operating at the moment? We heard for years there were two machines in, for example, Tullamore hospital, with one of them not being used. A few years ago, the Minister, when was asked before on the issue of scoliosis in relation to Crumlin hospital, said he was going to get an additional machine to help with the backlog. Will Ms Kelleher give us a sense as to where those machines are down?

Not having the staff for the machines is the big crisis. We hear all the time about the amount of money that is being spent on the health service, but it is almost like we are spending more money to stand still. There is huge money, but also huge gaps in this regard. Our population, as the witness said in her own contribution, has grown. Thankfully, we have a young population. We also have an older population who, we know from the statistics, are staying longer in hospital. The reality is we are faced with those challenges, which are positive ones for society, given that people are living longer. We have to back that up, however. We say all the time that these are the people who built the economy and we need to look after them. That is the general consensus of everyone. We do not, however, have the staff to do it. When we throw out all these figures, people do not really understand them. If a nurse is missing on a particular ward, who fills that gap? That is the big challenge.

Ms Ní Sheaghdha mentioned the number of assaults. If someone is waiting for a long time, the tension that arises, particularly in an emergency department, is understandable, and I am not excusing such behaviour. We do not have the services within the community because we know for a fact the community services, or many of the key members of them, are missing, so people cannot get those services. We are told the best place for people to be is in their own home, but people cannot get the services in their home. A number of steps must be taken. While trying to fix this is not rocket science, the impression at home is that this is impossible. There has been reference to the Department of Health as "Angola" and the question has arisen of who would want to work in it. A lot of staff want to work in it. They see the wastage and the challenges. The biggest frustration when talking to members of the witnesses’ union is that they see that this can be fixed with not a huge amount of money or anything else. If there is a moratorium on jobs, those jobs are obsolete. It then takes six months to fill them, which creates a gap and means you are falling behind. I can understand the frustration of people wanting to get out of the service to go abroad and get into a service which works and provides a better quality of life. The message we need to be sending, as a committee, is that these people are doing really positive work and we want them to continue.

Will the witness give us a sense as to where the worst challenges are with regard to radiation services? Is there a specific geographic area in question? Are the challenges in the Dublin area or throughout the country?