asked the Minister for Health if, in view of the grave public disquiet at the serious disruption of hospital services at St. Laurence's, the withdrawal by the hospital from the Dublin accident and emergency services rota and the closure of most of the hospital in-patient and out-patient services, she will indicate the steps she is taking to have all services restored immediately.
Private Notice Questions. - Dublin Hospital Dispute.
I very much regret, as do the board of the hospital, the disruption of services which has taken place as a result of this dispute. I am as anxious as the Deputy that the dispute should be settled fairly and quickly.
The Deputy will, I hope, accept that my function in any dispute situation is to ensure that there are adequate procedures available fo facilitate its earliest possible settlement and to do all in my power to have these procedures fully used.
I feel that it is important to make it very clear that both the board of the hospital and my Department have provided, right up to this day, every possible opportunity to the staff involved to demonstrate the validity of their claim. A full hearing of the Labour Court was held in October last to examine the dispute. In its recommendation, the court stated that it was not in a position to recommend any increase and noted that the workers concerned had "declined to allow the Court to gather the information necessary to establish their claim that the work which they perform is more onerous than that performed by porters in other hospitals."
Since then, management have had a number of meetings with union representatives in an attempt to resolve the dispute. They have offered to make a lump sum payment in full and final settlement of the men's claim — the amount to be determined by an agreed arbitrator. They have indicated that an immediate payment on account of £600 would be made to each porter pending receipt of the arbitrator's recommendation. This has been rejected by the union. No progress was possible at a conciliation conference which was held in the Labour Court on 7 January and the meeting was adjourned. I am glad to inform the Deputy that arrangements have now been made for a resumption of this conference on Thursday next, 28 January. Any further comment by me on the situation at this juncture would be inappropriate.
Therefore, the Minister is fully aware of the importance of this hospital not only to the north side of the city but to Dublin generally in the sense that the hospital is a national neurosurgery centre. I have had representations from many people around the country concerning extreme emergency cases which cannot be dealt with because of the dispute. The surgeons are doing everything in their power to deal with the situation but the accident and emergency services have been discontinued while the out-patients clinic is closed.
Has the Deputy a question?
Would the Minister not agree that this is a case in which there is the possibility of devising a formula to buy out the agreement. The men in question have a benefit that is additional to that enjoyed by those in other hospitals but the central issue is the question of buying out this benefit in order to rationalise the system throughout the hospitals. It appears that there is much urgency about reaching agreement on a buying out price. I trust that the Minister's resumed talks will lend to the situation a real sense of urgency, something which I am afraid has not been present since the talks broke down on 23 December.
This is a very long supplementary.
On the question of urgency, it is my function, as I said in reply to the question to ensure that the proper machinery is used. I am following a precedent set by one of my predecessors, the Leader of the Opposition, in the case of a similar strike in 1979.
In so far as services at the hospital are concerned, I agree that the hospital is not fully operational. On average there are only about 220 beds in use out of a total bed complement of 388. All emergency cases are being admitted and some non-emergency cases where beds are available from within the number of beds being serviced.
The hospital have withdrawn from the accident and emergency ambulance rota system but they are admitting head injury cases. The casualty department at the hospital is open and patients are treated there, but only emergency cases are admitted to the hospital from the casualty department.
The geriatric unit attached to the hospital has been closed and the patients have been transferred to another area of the hospital which is being serviced. The geriatric unit is situated some distance from the main hospital buildings.
The hospital have agreed to make some medical beds available to any of the other general hospitals in the north city area who have an overcrowding problem arising from an increased intake through their accident and emergency departments as the result of St Laurence's Hospital withdrawing from the accident and emergency rota scheme.
I agree that there is a problem but up to now it has been contained in the main to reasonable proportions. I am very hopeful regarding a satisfactory outcome of the situation. My Department will do everything possible to ensure that the resumed conciliation talks at the Labour Court on Thursday will have a satisfactory outcome. In the meantime we should leave the matter at that.
I am glad that the talks are being resumed and I wish the Minister every success in bringing about a satisfactory resolution of this problem.
Is the Minister aware of the extreme difficulty in which the nursing staff at this hospital find themselves because of their having to take on the duties of the domestic staff who have stopped work in sympathy with the porters? Is it not a ludicrous situation that nurses should have to assume the duties of domestic staff and is the Minister doing anything about that problem?
I am aware that there are problems. The Department and myself appreciate very much the way in which the staff at the hospital have been managing to keep services operational. As I have said to Deputy Woods, I hope that the problem will be resolved at the talks due to take place on Thursday next and that services can be restored fully.