Deputy Rabbitte gave me notice of his intention to raise the decision of the Department of Health not to proceed with the construction of the long promised Tallaght Regional Hospital in 1991. Deputy Rabbitte knows the procedure—five minutes to his good self and five minutes to the Minister of State to reply.
Adjournment Debate. - Proposed Tallaght Hospital.
A Cheann Comhairle, I am deeply grateful to you for permitting me to raise this urgent and vital issue because of the importance of the proposed new Tallaght Regional Hospital not only for the people of my constituency but the wider population of the regional catchment area.
The people of Tallaght, Clondalkin, Walkinstown, Rathcoole and the surrounding region have greeted with disbelief, shock and dismay the reply given by the Minister for Health, Dr. O'Hanlon, to my parliamentary question last Thursday when he stated, "the building of the new Tallaght hospital will not commence in 1991". Despite rumours since budget day, 30 January, this decision was a bombshell for the people of the area who looked forward to the hospital at last commencing in 1991. People see not only the desperately needed local facility which the hospital offers in terms of hospital care but also a badly needed boost to economic activity in the Tallaght region and the promise of jobs at construction stage to some of the thousands of unemployed building workers in the area.
I tried to raise this matter with the Taoiseach on the Order of Business but to no avail. Finally, on 7 February the Minister for Health revealed shattering news for a constituency that has been underprovided and whose electorate have had to fight for everything they got. How can the Minister, and the Fianna Fáil/Progressive Democrats Government, justify this appalling decision? After all the sod turning, promises and disappointments, the Minister told me on 6 March 1990, in answer to a parliamentary question that, "The Tallaght hospital project is currently at an advanced stage of planning and it is expected that construction will commence in 1991 and that commissioning will be completed by 1994."
I pursued the Minister again as recently as 29 November 1990 when he told me, "The Tallaght hospital board have recently submitted the list of selected tenderers for approval to my Department". Surely people were justified in taking from that reply that at last the contractor would be on site in the summer of 1991. I want to put the full text of the Minister's reply to my question of 7 February on the record of the House. He said:
The Tallaght hospital project is currently at an advanced stage of planning and it is expected that construction will commence in 1991 and that commissioning will be completed by 1994.
I pursued the Minister again as recently as 29 November 1990 when he told me:
The Tallaght hospital board have recently submitted a list of selected tenderers for approval to my Department.
Surely people were justified in taking from that reply that at last the contractor would be on site in the summer of 1991. I want to put the full text of the Minister's reply to my question of 7 February 1991 on the record of the House.
The capital allocation available to my Department for 1991 does not allow for the commencement of any major new capital project. In the circumstances the building of the new Tallaght hospital will not commence in 1991. I am at present preparing a submission to Government on the capital requirements of the health services in future years and this will include provision for the Tallaght project.
What in Heaven's name are the people of Tallaght and Clondalkin and the surrounding region to make of that reply? What does it mean? When will work on the Tallaght hospital commence?
I recall for the House that in the Tallaght area alone we are talking about a bigger population than Limerick city and I remind the House that a Government backbencher withdrew his support from the Government because of the threatened closure of one of three hospitals in the city of Limerick. We have a larger population in my constituency than that city and we have no hospital. How can the Government justify, for example, the implications of this for the tens of thousands of children in Dublin South-West and the surrounding area? It has been planned since the FitzGerald report of 1968. The Tallaght hospital board was set up in 1980. The Fianna Fáil Party campaigned for office on the promise that it would — and I have the card here — provide a rapid rail service and complete the Tallaght hospital. Only last Saturday I had to leave my advice centre early in order to bring a mother and her child to the Children's Hospital after the child had pulled down a frying pan on top of himself. The alternative that mother had was that she would wait to take two buses to the Children's Hospital. It is almost unbelievable that the Government announced this decision on the same week as they appointed a TD from the constituency, Deputy Chris Flood, to become Minister of State at the Department of Health.
It is generally believed that the appointment of a Minister from the constituency would be helpful to such major projects in his own constituency. This must be the first example known where the appointment of a Minister was accompanied by the Minister's own Department stopping a project. It has been said that the purpose of Deputy Flood's appointment has been to secure a second seat for Fianna Fáil in Dublin South-West. Things have come to a very sad state indeed if the winning of a second seat for Fianna Fáil in Dublin South-West is considered more important than the building of a hospital for the people of Dublin-South-West. I want to know tonight from the Minister for Health and indeed from the two Ministers of State from my own constituency, who I am glad to see are in the House, Deputy Flood and Deputy Harney, when work on the Tallaght Regional Hospital will commence and when it will be commissioned? That is the question that concerns the people of Dublin South-West who have been so dismayed and disappointed by the Minister's and the Government's decision.
I am very glad the Deputy has afforded me this opportunity to clarify the position in relation to the new hospital at Tallaght. As Deputies will be aware, we have embarked over the past 15 years on a major development programme in our general hospital service. This has culminated in the upgrading of many hospitals and the building of a number of major new hospitals throughout the country. In so far as Dublin is concerned, the original plan provided for six major hospitals, three on the north side, Beaumont Hospital, the Mater Hospital and Blanchardstown Hospital, and three on the south side, St. James' Hospital, St. Vincent's Hospital and the new hospital at Tallaght.
With the opening of the new Mater Hospital recently and the commissioning of the new hospital at St. James' later this year, the only remaining part of the overall plan to be put in place will be the new hospital at Tallaght. Tallaght always was and continues to be an integral part of the overall plan for hospital services for greater Dublin.
When?
The Deputy has had his say.
That is history.
The intention is that the Meath, the Adelaide and the National Children's Hospitals will form the nucleus of the new hospital at Tallaght. These hospitals otherwise known as the MANCH group have been closely associated since the move to Tallaght was first mooted. The new general hospital at Tallaght will serve the south-west of County Dublin, County Kildare and west Wicklow. The hospital will have a wide range of specialities and, as already mentioned, the existing Meath, Adelaide and National Children's hospitals will form its nucleus.
The Tallaght hospital project has now reached an advanced stage in the planning process. The total estimated cost of the project is £118 million. The construction period will be four years following which a further 18 months will be required for commissioning. The present position is that the capital allocation to my Department in 1991 does not allow for the commencement of any major new capital project. However, my colleague the Minister for Health, Dr. O'Hanlon and I are at present preparing a programme of capital developments for the health services over the next few years and I wish to assure the House that this will include as a priority item provision for the new hospital at Tallaght.
Live horse and get grass.
The commencement date for this major project, the single most expensive health capital project undertaken in this country will depend on the availability of resources.
No problem.
I will take this opportunity to remind Deputy Rabbitte that he was the Deputy who traversed the constituency of Dublin South-West announcing in the autumn of 1989 — having read the Estimates — that the Tallaght Regional College was not going ahead. The Tallaght Regional Technical College did go ahead.
You cannot put patients in it.
Surprisingly, Deputy Rabbitte did not return to his constituents to tell them he had made a mistake. He made a similar statement with regard to The Square in Tallaght——
The Minister erected a sign for the Tallaght hospital in 1989.
——and he did not return to tell his constituents he had got it wrong for a second time.
Only that I picketed it in 1985 it would not be there.
I suggest to Deputy Rabbitte that he will have got it wrong for a third time. I further suggest to Deputy Rabbitte that he appears to have an inbuilt desire to ensure that all those projects which have been provided for Tallaght——
And delivered on time.
——during the lifetime of the Fianna Fáil Administration since 1987 would not proceed.
——are delivered on time and the Minister has just confirmed that.
I want to thank the Deputy for affording me the opportunity to reiterate my commitment and that of my colleague the Minister for Health, Dr. O'Hanlon, and the Government to the building and opening of the Tallaght hospital as soon as public finances permit.
When will it be built — in the next century?
The Deputy has got it wrong again.