I am glad to get the opportunity to raise this issue again. I will tell the Minister of State why I am doing it again. I raised this matter exactly a month ago, on 12 May, with the Minister of State, Deputy O'Donnell. We spoke at length about the need and the urgency of opening the community hospital in Killarney. On 29 May, there was a meeting arranged between the HSE locally and the five TDs from Kerry, one of whom is me. It was laid out clearly in front of us by the HSE people, who I believe are in charge of Cork and Kerry, that the community hospital would open before the end of June. That was on 29 May. About a week ago, it was made known to the county councillors that it would not open at the end of June. I will not speak for the other Deputies but I feel my credibility is being undermined by this kind of carry-on, which is what I would call it. We were told clearly it was going to open and the patients would be transferred from the old district hospital to the new community hospital building before the end of June. Who is calling the shots? Is it the HSE at national level? Is it the Minister? Who has the power or the responsibility? Who directed these people? Did they take it upon themselves? I do not think they did. Someone informed them to relay to us that the hospital would open before the end of June. I want an answer to that. I do not know whether the Minister of State can give it to me. I thought it might be the Minister of State who was here last month but I have learned he has gone away, and that is fine. The man is entitled to go about his business but I thought it would be him here. There are many elderly patients waiting to get into this public nursing home. We have excellent private nursing homes all around Killarney but we need a dementia unit. It is critical for so many because there are people getting dementia at a younger age. There were to be 30 beds opening for dementia patients as part of this. Many of the private nursing homes cannot cater for dementia patients or do not have the facilities. We are begging for this on our knees. The lights have been on in the building since before Christmas and it was cleared to go. I raised with the Minister of State, Deputy O'Donnell, that the INMO said there was no engagement by the HSE with it regarding the staffing. The HSE said it was engaging with the INMO every second day or every second week. Who is telling the truth? It will come out now that the reason for the delay is exactly that, namely, that the INMO and also HIQA have questions to be answered.
Sentiment score: 0.07
It is hard to see the children's hospital ever opening-----
Sentiment score: -0.10
-----if the Government cannot open a community hospital in Killarney.
Sentiment score: 0.00
All right. Thank you very much.
Sentiment score: 0.18
I thank the Minister of State for her reply but practically everything she read out was read out by the Minister of State, Deputy O'Donnell, a month ago. Here we are with this confusion again placed upon the people of Killarney and the surrounding area. Surely the HSE knew the hospital was to be finished before the end of last December. Surely it knew staffing arrangements would have to be agreed with the INMO. Surely it knew HIQA would have to have everything certified. Why was that not done? It has had nearly two years to organise all this and we are being told the same thing today that I was told a month ago. So much is contingent on this hospital opening. We need extra respite services in Killarney, which were to go into the whole district. We need a minor injuries unit, which I think was going into St. Columbanus's Community Hospital, and a primary care centre. All these things are held up while this is being finalised. The summer holidays will come and I am worried the new hospital will not be open and there will be nothing at all done about those three things, especially the extra respite services that are needed. I see people could not go on holidays last year after minding their elderly or sick parents, sisters or brothers. They had no place for the patients to go. We were promised that would be decided and sorted out for this summer but it is not going to be. That is the crib I have. It is terrible to think there is some fooling and carry-on going on in the HSE. God knows it is getting enough money to spend it properly, to see it is properly done and to see things like this are done in a timely fashion.
Sentiment score: 0.06