The House will now hear one minute statements on matters appropriate to the Minister for the Environment and to the Minister for Health. I propose to call on Deputy Nealon and Deputy McGinley to make one minute statements appropriate to the Minister for the Environment in the first instance and they will be followed by Deputy Spring. Deputy O'Donoghue, Deputy Nealon, Deputy Hogan and Deputy McGinley who will make statements appropriate to the Minister for Health.
Adjournment Debate. - Environment and Health Matters.
Sligo Corporation have their worst housing crisis in a quarter of a century, a grim verdict on what is called national progress. There are now 300 people on the waiting list, and these are extreme cases. Many others are in need of housing but do not think it is worth their while applying.
The acute problem is relatively recent because of the Government's failure to build a single house in the area since 1987 — all this despite the fact that a scheme for 101 houses in Maugheraboy actually went for tender before Fianna Fáil came to office. The Minister has finally sanctioned a quarter of this scheme, but that is no use. I call on the Minister, as a minimum gesture, to sanction an immediate start on all this scheme.
Sligo County Council had almost got on top of the housing needs in their area in 1987, but since then no major new scheme has been started. The council have been starved of funds and are gradually sinking back to the bad old days. The Minister now has an opportunity to help put things right. I would particularly appeal to him to provide funds for the housing scheme in Aclare, County Sligo, where the houses are badly needed and a generous donation to the project was made by a priest from the area. This scheme would transform the heart of an old town.
The parish of Gweedore in the Donegal Gaeltacht is generally accepted as being one of the most densely populated rural areas in this country, if not in Europe. There are about 1,500 families in the parish and about 1,000 of them are living within a radius of two miles. There is also an industrial estate, employing between 800 and 900 people, five hotels, about 15 pubs and clubs, a community school and five primary schools.
This entire area is without any sewerage facilities and all are depending on septic tanks. During the summer season the population often doubles and trebles with the influx of tourists. The critical stage has now been reached where further development in the centre of the parish is becoming impossible. A sewerage scheme has been promised for many years but due to lack of funding an essential estuarial survey cannot be completed. I am asking the Minister as a matter of urgency to immediately allocate resources to enable this survey to be carried out. Any further delay will have serious implications for the development of this Gaeltacht area and the health of its inhabitants.
I wish to bring to the attention of the Minister for Health a very serious problem that exists within the Southern Health Board area, that is, the inadequate number of acute beds available to the people of Kerry and Cork. This is putting enormous pressure on the health system and on the consultants and the people working in the hospital service who, when they have to make decisions, unfortunately, cannot be guided by the best health criteria.
I bring to the Minister's attention the fact that extra resources are needed immediately to provide extra beds in Tralee Regional Hospital, Cork Regional Hospital and Mallow Hospital, and I would like the Minister to give this consideration because the health board cannot provide the beds without adequate funding.
On 5 February 1991, the Southern Health Board issued startling figures to their members on the ear, nose and throat facilities in the Southern Health Board region. It transpired that children in County Kerry are obliged to wait one year for an operation, whereas children in Mallow, County Cork, have to wait only three months and those going to the South Infirmary in Cork have to wait for between six and eight weeks. Under the Constitution, the children of the nation are to be cherished equally and in a democracy it is desirable that this should be the position. I am urging the Minister to instruct the Southern Health Board to implement the system where the waiting list can be wiped out in County Kerry by transferring the operations to Mallow and the South Infirmary, if that has to be done in the short term, and to provide a more adequate ENT service in County Kerry in the future.
A Leas-Cheann Comhairle, your job is becoming like that of Magnus Magnusson, who says you have one minute starting from now.
Sligo now has a magnificent new hospital. We are all very proud of it, and we are very thankful for it. The new hospital was opened a short while ago but no sooner was it opened than we learned that, except for emergencies it was to be closed for five weeks in the summer and four weeks at Christmas, twice as long as last year. The slow down before the closing of the wards and the build up afterwards, means that the hospital is being closed for three months of the year. The reason, of course, is due to the financial cutbacks.
The North-Western Health Board, the most efficient health board in the country, are being forced to take drastic action to make ends meet. They were forced to take something like £250,000 from community care to balance their budget. We have a magnificent new hospital but the result will be longer waiting lists, even than the present intolerable levels. This is a crazy situation, as I am sure the Minister agrees. I hope the Sligo experience will help him to squeeze more money from the Government for health purposes.
St. Luke's Hospital was originally designed to have 125 beds for a catchment of 55,000 people in County Kilkenny. The hospital now provides acute care services for 100,000 people in the counties of Kilkenny and Carlow. For the past 12 to 15 years it has been necessary to care for emergency admissions in the corridors of this hospital on a daily basis because of the lack of space in the wards. Some patients spend the whole of their hospital stay on busy hospital corridors and have no privacy. I am asking the Minister for Health to immediately sanction the go ahead for the extension of St. Luke's Hospital. I want to remind him that the people of Kilkenny are very angry and I hope he will be able to clarify the situation satisfactorily for them this evening.
Donegal is one of the most rural of rural counties and cardiac arrest patients have to be transported from every part of the county, including the islands of Tory and Aran Mór, to Letterkenny General Hospital, the only hospital in the county where cardiac treatment is available.
It often takes hours for critically ill patients to get to Letterkenny Hospital. Indeed, there have, unfortunately been many instances of heart attack patients passing away in transit. There is a county wide campaign at present in progress to collect funds to have ambulances equipped with facilities such as defibrillators, resuscitators and other equipment that could save the lives of patients. It is difficult to understand that in Dublin and other cities such facilities are provided in ambulances where most people live within minutes of fully equipped hospitals. The Donegal campaign is receiving widespread financial support. There are nightly functions being organised to collect funds. I am asking the Minister for Health to consider as a matter of urgency allocating funds to match the contributions of the Donegal people so that fully equipped cardiac ambulances will be available in the county to save lives and unnecessary suffering.
Anois, an Aire Stáit, Deputy Chris Flood, to demonstrate that he can do in five minutes what it has taken seven to present to him.
It is not true to say that there is a housing crisis in Sligo, or, for that matter, anywhere in this country.
The Minister for the Environment recently published a "Plan for Social Housing" which introduced a range of complementary measures to meet the various housing needs throughout the country. In the very near future, the Minister will be issuing the 1991 capital allocations for the local authority housing construction programme. The capital provision for the programme as a whole has been increased by 38 per cent to £45.6 million this year. This will enable local authorities to complete 1,300 houses and start a further 1,500 in 1991. Deputy Nealon may be assured that Sligo will get an allocation appropriate to the needs of the area.
In regard to Gweedore sewerage scheme, a preliminary report for a sewerage scheme to serve Gweedore was approved by the Department of the Environment in August 1983 and Donegal County Council was requested to carry out an estuarial survey in connection with the proposed sea outfall. The survey was carried out in 1988 and showed that, even with a 2,000 metre outfall, the offshore waters at this location are unsuitable as a discharge point. Rather than extend the survey the council have sought advice from EOLAS. A further submission from the council is now awaited by the Department. The question of allocating resources for further survey work does not therefore arise at this time.
With regard to the Southern Health Board issue raised by Deputy Spring, at no stage has the Minister for Health promised that there will be an additional 1,000 hospital beds available this year. As has been said on previous occasions in the House by the Minister for Health and myself, the Government are committed to maintaining services in 1991 at a level not less than that which was approved for 1990.
With regard to the ear, nose and throat service as raised by Deputy O'Donoghue, these services are available in the Southern Health Board area at the South Infirmary-Victoria Hospital, which is the regional centre for ENT, the Mercy Hospital and Mallow Hospital. ENT services are provided at Tralee General Hospital by arrangement with two consultants from the Bon Secours Hospital, Tralee. Extra resources were made available to the Southern Health Board in this regard in 1989 for the provision of in-patient paediatric ENT services at Tralee General Hospital.
ENT waiting lists in the region have decreased dramatically in recent years. The waiting list has been reduced by over 80 per cent at the regional unit in the South Infirmary-Victoria Hospital since 1987. There are about 74 children awaiting admission to Tralee General Hospital for ENT treatment. This represents a reduction of about 29 per cent in the numbers awaiting treatment since February 1990.
The organisation and development of ENT services at Tralee General Hospital is a matter in the first instance for the Southern Health Board. Comhairle na nOspidéal examined ENT services in the Southern Health Board area and made recommendations on the future development of such services at consultant level. The report recommends the appointment of one wholetime consultant ENT surgeon at Tralee General Hospital subject to the Southern Health Board making, in advance, a formal contractual arrangement with the Bon Secours Hospital, Tralee, to provide consultant cover for the appointee at Tralee General Hospital.
I understand that the Southern Health Board is at present considering the recommendations made in the comhairle report.
With regard to the Sligo General Hospital, the provision of hospital services in Sligo General Hospital is a matter for the North-Western Health Board in the first instance. Seasonal bed closures are a normal feature of hospital services since 1985. The closure of 70 beds for five weeks in the summer and four weeks at Christmas is planned to coincide with the main holiday periods. During that period it would be difficult to maintain full staffing levels as it is sometimes difficult to recruit suitably qualified locums during these holidays periods. During these periods the demand for hospital beds would be at its lowest level. Emergency and trauma cases are not affected by the closures.
The elective beds which are closed during these periods include some ENT, ophthalmology, gynaecology and orthopaedic beds.
The development at Sligo Regional Hospital involves an eight story extension to Sligo Hospital opened on 13 January 1991. The extension has a comprehensive A & E department which includes its own theatre and skull X ray unit. The development also has a new admissions area and a new obstetrics and gynaecology department with a delivery suite. The hospital has new medical wards, a new CCU and day theatres and ICU have also been provided.
Stage 2 of the project involves alterations to the original hospital and will be completed in 1993.
With regard to St. Luke's Hospital in Kilkenny raised by Deputy Hogan, the Minister has accepted that the provision of additional facilities at St. Luke's Hospital is a priority and in 1990 he gave his approval to the expenditure of £144,000 to proceed with the planning of the proposed three storey development. Building will commence as soon as resources are available.
On-going discussions are taking place between officials of my Department and the South-Eastern Health Board to try to resolve some of the service difficulties at the hospital.
With regard to the cardiac ambulance facility as raised by Deputy McGinley, the provision of ambulance services, including cardiac ambulance services in County Donegal, is a matter for the North-Western Health Board. I understand that the board are supporting local voluntary efforts in this area.
The board obtains the funding to provide ambulance services from their allocation. The question of cardiac ambulances in general is being considered by my Department at present.
The Dáil adjourned at 5.40 p.m. until 2.30 p.m. on Tuesday, 12 March, 1991.