I want to express my dismay over the pausing of the DART+ project. It is a retrograde step for communities in the Minister’s constituency, mine and the greater Dublin area. I want to talk about health infrastructure. The €9.25 billion allocation is simply not adequate when one considers the digitalisation programme, the National Maternity Hospital and the beds that need to be delivered. The Minister for Health, Deputy Carroll MacNeill, has spoken about the need to do something very real in Limerick, yet the money is not available. Both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael manifestos committed to delivering between 4,000 and 5,000 hospital beds over the lifetime of this Government, or 1,000 per year, yet we see that just 124 acute beds were delivered up to September last year. The service plan for this year commits to 134 net new beds. That is a joke. The reality, having regard to occupancy, is that conditions in many of our hospitals are very unsafe. Last year, 1,415 beds were lost because of delayed transfers of care. There is a lack of urgency from the Government. We need to ensure a more appropriate amount of money is in place for the health system.

Sentiment score: 0.06