I call on the Minister for Health and Children to institute an immediate public sworn inquiry into all aspects of the Dr. Neary affair and the serious implications that has for the delivery of health services in Ireland. I have lived in Drogheda most of my life and know many people who have worked at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital. The women who were operated on by Dr. Neary, in particular, experienced major trauma. The staff of the hospital have done a fantastic job, despite the appalling events which took place in the midst of all the good work.
It took four and a half years for the Medical Council to report on what happened. That is unacceptable and should not be tolerated in future inquiries. There is a need for the Minister to address that issue. The women involved need closure on this affair, which has gone on for many years. Their lives have been shattered by what has happened. The Minister must reflect on whether the inquiry should be sworn and held in public. I refer to the comments of Mr. Justice Finnegan in the High Court when the matter came before him. He stated:
The evidence that the Medical Council presented disclosed a series of profound errors of judgment on Dr. Neary's part with serious consequences for each of his patients. . . It is found that a regrettable absence of insight and objectivity and non-existence of any mechanism either within the hospital or elsewhere to ensure that such errors as occurred might be corrected or that a pattern of adverse or unusual outcomes should be properly monitored.
I welcome the Minister's announcement that Ms Justice Harding Clark has been appointed to chair the inquiry. These issues must be addressed for the greater good. The traditional hierarchical power of the surgeon to supersede all the important mechanisms and checks and balances in the administration of the health system must be addressed. That is the kernel of what I seek.
Tribunals and other investigations have been a great failure, including shattering cases which were taken to the inquiry into sexual abuse recently. Last weekend the Minister for Health and Children was attacked by a judge in regard to another tribunal with which people were deeply unhappy. It is important that the Minister and the Government should get this inquiry right. The State cannot afford to mess this up. There must be total clarity about what the Minister is doing and total transparency in the investigation process. The public should have the right to know what is going on at every stage.
The women who were affected would like to tell their stories in public so that the truth can come out. They do not wish to pillory individuals in the hospital nor do they have a vendetta against them. That issue was addressed in the judgment of the Medical Council. However, they feel doctors, nurses and other staff should give evidence in public without the disclosure of their identities. These women want transparency, they want to get at the truth and, above all, they want to make sure this never happens again. The Minister and the Government have a duty of care, given their knowledge of what went wrong and the horrors involved. The inquiry must be totally transparent and open. The bottom line is the women involved must have closure and this must never happen again.
