Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 12 Feb 2004

Vol. 579 No. 6

Adjournment Debate.

Nursing Home Subventions.

Mr. Wall

I welcome the opportunity to raise this issue. Representations at Members' clinics in south Kildare have increased dramatically as a result of overcrowding in Naas General Hospital and the effect it is having on families of senior citizens who are in a position to return home but whose families are unable to provide the required care. They are unable to find accommodation in nursing homes in Kildare because the nursing home subvention does not meet the financial demands imposed by nursing homes and because the South Western Area Health Board closed the respite and assessment unit in St. Vincent's Hospital in Athy.

In the past four days, I have been visited by four different families who face pressure to bring their loved ones home from the hospital because it seeks to alleviate overcrowding. None of these families was in a position to do this so we sought the nursing home subvention. There are three rates for the nursing home subvention — medium, second and high rate — and they reflect the costs of nursing home accommodation. I presume that is because patients who are able to look after their own needs would be given the lower rate while those who are not able to care for themselves would be given the higher rate. That is not reflected in the costings given by the nursing homes. They give only one cost which does not reflect the different rates in nursing home subvention.

There is also a problem regarding the enhanced subvention. I learned from a reply to a parliamentary question that there was a waiting list for the enhanced subvention in south Kildare. We are trying to use the nursing home system to move patients from Naas Hospital to St. Vincent's for secondary care, but it is not possible because in practically all cases there is a shortfall in the payment of around €200 per week and the families are not in a position to meet that.

I ask that the 21-bed assessment and respite unit at St. Vincent's Hospital be re-opened. I spoke to the staff there and learned that there is a great demand for it to be re-opened. It is necessary for the Department of Health and Children and the Department of Finance, through the South Western Area Health Board, to provide the necessary funding to allow the director of nursing there to hire nurses to ensure that unit can be re-opened. That would immediately clear the overcrowding at Naas Hospital, whereby people in need of secondary care could move to Athy, as was the practice prior to the closure of this assessment and respite unit. It was a secondary care facility for such patients and freed up capacity in Naas Hospital.

In light of the amount of money that has been spent on Naas Hospital, it is crazy that some people still have to be cared for on trolleys and chairs. Members may have seen reports on television and elsewhere of 30 to 40 people being cared for in such circumstances during the past few weekends in that hospital which has been upgraded. There is an obvious solution. First, money must be provided to re-open the assessment and respite unit in St. Vincent's Hospital in Athy. Second, the Minister must revisit the operation of the nursing home subvention because it is not working. Nursing homes are not applying it as intended because the rates are too low in the first instance and there is a waiting list for the enhanced subvention.

The health system in Kildare is clogged up. Families are experiencing major problems in trying to facilitate their loved ones and bring them home or in trying to get them into a secondary care facility to get some respite to then be able to bring them home. I ask the Minister to examine the nursing home subvention, the enhanced subvention and, most importantly, the provision of funding for the re-opening of the 21-bed assessment and respite unit, which could be used to alleviate the overcrowding.

Mr. Durkan

I support the case made by my colleague from south Kildare.

Minister of State at the Department of Health and Children (Mr. Callely)

I thank Deputy Wall for raising this matter and Deputy Durkan for supporting it. I point out to the Deputies that responsibility for the provision of services at Naas General Hospital and at St. Vincent's Hospital, Athy, rests with the South Western Area Health Board and the Eastern Regional Health Authority.

Naas General Hospital has a current bed complement of 193 and provides general, medical and surgical services, acute psychiatric services and medical and social assessments to a population of approximately 180,000 in the Kildare-west Wicklow catchment area. Major developments, involving multimillion euro investments, are taking place in Naas General Hospital. I was happy to be chairman of the ERHA, or perhaps it was then the EHB, when we signed contracts for such developments. Deputy Wall was in attendance on the day along with my ministerial colleague, Deputy McCreevy. There are different phases in the development programme, the details of which I will not go into. On completion of the development the hospital will have a bed complement of 279 beds, inclusive of recovery beds, psychiatric beds, medical assessment beds, ICU beds and day services beds, and all the services emanating from the hospital will be greatly enhanced. I take this opportunity to compliment the staff of the hospital who continue to provide a service despite the disturbance caused by the major developments taking place.

Pressures on the hospital system, particularly in the eastern region, which includes Naas General Hospital, arise from increases in hospital admissions through emergency departments and from difficulties associated with patients who no longer require acute care and treatment but who are still dependent and awaiting placement in the sub-acute setting. A number of measures have been introduced aimed at addressing these issues including the provision of additional acute hospital beds in line with the report Acute Hospital Bed Capacity — A national Review. Some 568 acute beds have been commissioned to date on foot of the report, of which 253 are in the eastern region. Of these, 61 have been commissioned at Naas General Hospital. Revenue funding of approximately €40 million has already been made available to the ERHA for these beds.

An additional €8.8 million has been allocated to the ERHA to facilitate the discharge of patients from the acute system to a more appropriate setting, thereby freeing up acute hospital beds. It allows for funding through the subvention system of additional beds in the private nursing home sector and ongoing support in the community. Already this funding has resulted in the discharge of more than 220 patients from acute hospitals in the eastern region. Planning for the discharge of patients by acute hospitals, together with ongoing liaison with community services have been prioritised by the authority. A number of tremendous initiatives have been undertaken in the community, with which Deputy Wall is familiar. I am happy to have launched one of these in my area, the Homefirst project. Other projects include Slán Abhaile and the home subvention. I have also rolled out the personal care packages, PCPs. All these projects are within the Eastern Regional Health Authority. They contribute to providing alternative care packages for older people to enable them to be discharged home, which is where they want to be.

I acknowledge there are some difficulties, as Deputy Wall pointed out, with the closure of beds and the current subvention system. Currently, 20 beds are closed in St. Vincent's Hospital, Athy, but that is due to staffing difficulties. It has nothing to do with my Department in respect of funding or the opening of beds; it is a local staffing issue. It is regrettable that the money is available, as well as other supports.

The advice I have received is that the ERHA is actively working with all the area boards under its functional area to ensure the opening of any long-term beds that are currently closed, including the beds at St. Joseph's unit to which Deputy Wall referred.

I met some geriatricians and indicated to them that I intend to have a round table meeting with some of my Department officials to deal with some of the issues Deputy Wall raised. I assure the Deputy that the Government will continue to invest in the development of high quality, equitable and accessible hospital services so that those availing of the services can continue to receive timely and appropriate care.

Gangland Killings.

Mr. Durkan

I welcome the opportunity to raise this issue which arose almost two weeks ago. It concerns a fellow who was on release, for one reason or another, from prison in a certain part of this city. He was serving a ten-year sentence but for some reason — there may have been compassionate reasons of which I am not aware — he was on release and in the course of that he was shot and killed.

I raise this matter because it is not good enough that organised killers can go about this or any other city and execute people at will. Whether they are guilty of some other offence is immaterial. This is the kind of practice that was pursued in Chicago in the late 1920s and early 1930s when it appeared that nobody ruled except the criminals. They were killing each other and the hope was they would eventually eliminate each other. That practice was found not to be a useful. It also created greater opportunities for revenge and counter-revenge and led to a breakdown in law and order.

I acknowledge the Minister's presence in the House to address this important issue. It has been pertinent for the past five to six years and is growing in importance daily. There is no law if there is contempt for the law. It appears that incidents such as the killing of Mr. Byrne can happen daily with impunity and that the Parliament and Government cannot stop them. The perpetrators disappear and we look for closed circuit television cameras to tell us who they were and where they have gone. The CCTV cameras were not much good in tracing the perpetrators of some crimes because the criminals carried umbrellas most of the time to ensure they would not be detected.

CCTV is fine and may offer some evidence on the location of a certain person at a specific time, but it is useless in detecting and preventing crime because there are those who can easily circumvent the system. A recent horrendous case in the United Kingdom serves as a classic example of how useless CCTV can be, especially if there are inadequate police patrols.

I call on the Minister to put in place the procedures to ensure that adequate steps are taken in the event of the early release of prisoners. I fully accept I do not know the reason for the early release of Mr. Byrne, but he had a severe sentence of ten years. I remember pleading for compassionate leave for prisoners to attend funerals and other events and being refused. This may have been for good reasons, yet the prisoners involved were not hardened criminals but involved in petty crimes or guilty of committing a first offence.

In the case in question, the prisoner was released and executed while on release, almost as if the State were involved in approving an execution. This is a most unnerving and worrying development. I hope the Minister has a thorough explanation why this came about and an assurance it will not occur again. There is nothing to be gained by debating this or other subjects in the House unless we can ensure such incidents do not recur, regardless of whether the victim is innocent or guilty. Nobody has the right to take the law into his own hands.

Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform (Mr. McDowell)

Deputy Durkan's written request for an Adjournment debate on this issue stated that the deceased man, Kenneth Byrne, was on temporary release when he was shot. That was certainly not the case. Mr. Byrne had been a prisoner in the training unit serving a sentence up to 19 January 2004 when he was released by a judge of the Dublin Circuit Court who had provided in advance that she would review his sentence after a certain time had elapsed.

My Department had no part in the release of Mr. Byrne. No decision was made in my Department which was bound by the judgment of the Dublin Circuit Court in this matter. At the time of Mr. Byrne's death, he was no longer a sentenced prisoner but one who had, in the eyes of the law, completed his sentence. He had, prior to the court review, been in prison since April 1999 serving a number of sentences for offences, including robbery and assault, and these sentences ranged from three months to seven years. Some of the sentences were concurrent and others consecutive. Since the courts are independent in the exercise of their judicial functions, I do not propose to comment further on that aspect of the case.

The Deputy will agree that the Court of Criminal Appeal has disapproved of the practice of the Judiciary's imposing sentences and providing for a judicial review of these sentences at a later date. That is a matter which, by law, is reserved for the Executive and someone such as me who is accountable to this Parliament regarding the manner in which I discharge that function. The Court of Criminal Appeal has specifically disapproved of the practice of releasing people by order of the Judiciary after their having served a portion of a sentence imposed on them by the Judiciary.

It may well be that, in this case, the learned Circuit Court judge indicated at the time of original sentence that she would review the sentence and felt that, having made this pubic indication of her intention, she was obliged to honour it. I am not sure about that but wish to clarify that my Department had no part in the release of this poor man from prison. It was not a case of temporary release, parole or otherwise; it was radically different.

The Deputy claimed what might be referred to as gangland killings happen frequently. The majority of criminal organisation related killings are under active Garda investigation. In most cases, a conclusion has been made as to the suspect and only a handful of perpetrators remain undetected. Last year, in spite of what some might believe having read about the crime problem, the number of murders decreased significantly since the previous year. This year, the rate of homicide has decreased yet again and continues to decrease. I hope this continues to be the case. Regardless of the criminal record of anybody who is shot down, a life is a life and the Constitution vindicates the right to life of all citizens. I agree with Deputy Durkan that it would be unacceptable if the State took the view that some people were below the protection of the law, just as we have often said that nobody is above the law.

Temporary release, which is not the subject of this debate, is normally used to prepare those coming towards the end of their sentences for re-integration with the community. For example, somebody serving a lengthy sentence could be let out from the same institution in which Mr. Byrne was held — I stress that he was not on temporary release — in which case that person could take up employment during the day to integrate himself into the community.

It would be wrong to suggest Mr. Byrne's release was due to a lack of prison spaces. There are 3,216 persons in custody today compared with 3,156 on the corresponding day last year.

Garda Investigations.

Mr. Gregory

The murders of Sylvia Shiels and Mary Callinan in Grangegorman in March 1997 were probably the most brutal of recent times. It would be difficult to imagine two more vulnerable victims than these unfortunate women. If for no other reason than the extreme callousness of the murder of these innocents, this case should be brought to finality, the person responsible prosecuted and justice seen to be done.

However, there is also another dimension, namely, the case of Dean Lyons who originally signed a statement of admission to the murders. We are told his untaped statement contained details that were known only to the murderer and to the investigating gardaí. If his statement contained information that he could not have known about — details that then made it possible to prosecute him for the crime — surely this is a matter that must be independently investigated and fully explained. We are also told that the taped written statement of Dean Lyons is, by way of contrast, a precise chronologically correct narrative about the murders in language way beyond his ability, in complete contrast to the confused incoherence of his earlier taped interview.

What rational explanation can there be for this? Surely an independent inquiry is essential on these grounds alone. As I have said before in this House, if Dean Lyons had been a person of affluence and influence and not a homeless heroin addict, it is most likely that we would have had an independent inquiry a long time ago. While the charges against him were dropped, he was allowed to die in poverty in England without having his name cleared.

The question that will not go away is what would have happened to Dean Lyons if Mark Nash had not murdered Carl and Catherine Doyle in Roscommon on 15 August of that same year and had Nash not then admitted to the Garda that it was he who had also murdered the two women in Grangegorman? Could the murders of Carl and Catherine Doyle have been avoided if the innocence of Dean Lyons had been established at the outset and it was known that the real murderer was still at large?

The sister of one of the murder victims, Sylvia Shiels, has again this week called for an inquiry, I believe rightly. Her solicitor has identified five areas where the standards set out under Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights have not been met, whereby the State must investigate all circumstances around the unlawful taking of life. He states that the Garda investigation did not meet the required standards as being transparent, effective, prompt, independent and involving the next of kin to the fullest extent. The solicitor said that an inquiry would have to establish: why nobody was ever successfully prosecuted; why Dean Lyons was charged with the crime and the charges later dropped; what steps were taken to investigate the confession made by Nash but later withdrawn; what internal inquiries were conducted by the Garda into the investigation of the case; and why the information surrounding the case could be outlined by the media, yet not a scrap of information was ever communicated directly to Miss Nolan, the surviving sister of one of the women who was murdered.

When I last raised this case by way of a priority question on 27 November 2002 the Minister stated that he would defer final decision on a further inquiry pending communications between the Garda Commissioner and the relatives and pending his own discussions with the Commissioner. Since then there has been only silence. Why is this so? This case demands an independent inquiry. I again call on the Minister to establish one.

Mr. McDowell

I am grateful to Deputy Gregory for raising this matter.

The facts as notified to me by the Garda authorities, are as follows. As Deputy Gregory has outlined, Sylvia Shiels and Mary Callinan were brutally murdered at Grangegorman during the night of 6 and 7 March 1997. In July 1997, the late Mr. Dean Lyons made a full confession to investigating Garda officers of his alleged guilt in the double murder. This confession was recorded on audio-video tape. Later the same day he made a further detailed admission of his alleged involvement in the murders. This second interview was not audio-visually recorded at Mr. Lyons's request. Following consultation between the Garda and the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, the person in question was charged with one of the murders at Grangegorman. In August 1997, another person, referred to by Deputy Gregory, who had been arrested and detained during the investigation of another double murder in County Roscommon, made a confession in relation to the Grangegorman murders. That person later retracted those admissions.

As a result of the admissions made by the second person, the Garda Commissioner appointed Assistant Commissioner James McHugh, who is now retired, and who I know personally to be a man of the utmost integrity, to review all available evidence on the Grangegorman murders.

The Garda authorities have stated that this investigation indicated that Mr. Lyons did not commit the murders in question. It also established that the manner in which Mr. Lyons had been interviewed about the case was in compliance with the Criminal Justice Act, 1984 (Electronic Recording of Interviews) Regulations 1997 which came into operation on 1 March 1997.

Following completion of his inquiry, Assistant Commissioner McHugh submitted a report to the Director of Public Prosecutions. In April 1998, after consideration of Assistant Commissioner McHugh's report, the Director of Public Prosecutions decided that criminal proceedings against Mr. Lyons be discontinued. In July 1999, Mr. Lyons presented a signed and witnessed statement denying any involvement in the Grangegorman murders. At that point we were confronted with a situation where both suspects have confessed and retracted their confessions. Having considered the file submitted to him by the Garda regarding the second individual who had confessed to the murders, the Director of Public Prosecutions decided that no prosecution should take place.

When the DPP decides not to prosecute in a particular case, the reasons for the decision are given to the State solicitor and the investigating gardaí. The DPP has stated that it is his policy not to disclose this information otherwise. This policy has been upheld by the Supreme Court. As the House is aware, I have no function regarding the prosecution of offences. This function is the responsibility of the Director of Public Prosecutions who is independent in the exercise of his functions, and it would therefore not be appropriate for me to intervene or comment on his decisions.

A letter from the solicitors representing the sister of one of the murder victims, Sylvia Shiels, was received in my office on 11 February. The letter asks that there be a fully independent public inquiry into the circumstances surrounding Ms Shiels's death and grounds this request on the protections afforded by the European Convention on Human Rights. In view of the matters raised in the letter and in order to assist me in my consideration of the request, I will again consult with the Garda authorities and the Office of the Attorney General. I expect to be in a position to respond to the solicitors' letter in the near future.

Regarding the statement made by Deputy Gregory that there had been nothing but silence since the last time I addressed this in the House, I understand that there would be communication with the relatives. I am sorry if that has not happened.

Mr. Gregory

That is the whole history of the case. That has happened again and again.

Mr. McDowell

Nonetheless, the situation that arises on foot of the letter that has arrived in my office will be addressed by me in the manner that I have indicated.

Archaeological Sites.

Mr. J. Bruton

I am here to highlight a matter of great importance. Ireland is a country with an exceptionally rich archaeological heritage. We have on this island some of the most outstanding remains of one of Europe's oldest civilisations. These rested largely undisturbed until the 19th century when mechanised agriculture began to damage and, in some cases, completely destroy things and places that had survived intact for two millennia.

In the past ten years a more urgent and immediate threat has emerged. This threat arises from the breakneck pace of infrastructural and residential development in Ireland. Much of this is concentrated in the east, the area of most dense settlement in prehistoric times and thus the area with the highest concentration of archaeological remains of previous civilisations.

An archaeological excavation, even if undertaken to the highest scientific standard, involves large-scale destruction of whatever is being excavated. Objects undisturbed and thus available to future generations are taken forever out of their historic context and brought somewhere else and the context itself is destroyed forever. If we are to destroy a portion of our heritage in this way in the interests of development, it is vital that the archaeological excavation that precedes the development is of the highest possible standard and that all of the information obtained is carefully collated and immediately analysed in the most systematic manner possible.

Against this background, I was horrified to learn last week that of 6,700 archaeological excavations carried out between 1997 and 2002 — each one of which had to be individually licensed by the State — more than one quarter had not been the subject of reports properly lodged with the authorities by the archaeologists in charge. There are now 1,514 archaeological excavations, conducted between 1997 and 2002 where the relevant excavation reports have not been lodged and where the data on the excavations are not available to be examined by the general public or by other persons carrying out research.

I raised this issue in a Dáil question before Christmas. Last week I eventually received a letter from the heritage and planning unit which said: "It would not necessarily be correct to assume that the remaining 1,514 reports were not submitted as at least some of them may be active and not yet lodged in our archive unit. Others would have been placed on planning files and not copied to the archive."

This is not reassuring. Two months after the tabling of my original question, the missing 1,514 reports have not been traced. Some of them may still be active and some may have been placed in the wrong file, but nobody can say for sure. How much confidence does that instil?

It is all the more a matter of concern when one bears in mind that many of these excavations have been carried out by archaeological conglomerates — businesses set up to avail of opportunities in archaeology in anticipation of infrastructural developments. If reports are not lodged on excavations, not only do we not know what, if anything, was found, we do not know whether the work should have been carried out or not. We do not know whether prior archaeological excavation should be required in similar cases in the future, and development held up at considerable expense. We should remember what is in question is possibly billions of euro in costs due to delays in projects to allow archaeological excavation in the first place. Then the reports are not even lodged and cannot be found after two months. What is the point of imposing those costs on the taxpayer and on developers if the excavation reports are not lodged?

I would also like to ask if there is adequate scrutiny of the excavation reports that are lodged. Does the Minister of State know if the Office of Public Works has a sufficient number of archaeologists on its staff to verify that the reports in question are accurate, complete and to a sufficiently high standard?

I understand there are staffing and computer problems in the relevant offices. However, the Government must ask itself whether the way in which it has been shunting around responsibility for archaeology between one Department and another — and within Departments — is not the main reason for these staffing and computer problems, and perhaps for an associated loss of staff morale. I believe a crisis exists in Irish archaeology. If our heritage is to be preserved — and it must be — we must have complete confidence in the judgment of the archaeological profession. This judgment must be one that balances immediate and genuine needs for development with those of archaeology. I am raising the matter today in order to ensure that this confidence exists.

Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government (Mr. N. Ahern)

I am grateful to the Deputy for raising the issue of outstanding excavation reports, which is one the Department is naturally concerned over. Deputy Bruton has given a full record of the situation. I cannot disagree with anything he has said.

The unprecedented upsurge in building and infrastructure development in recent years and its resultant impact on the archaeological heritage has, without question, put enormous pressures on the archaeological profession. My Department, through its role in licensing archaeological excavations, has played a major part in ensuring that development work is not delayed, while at same time providing for necessary archaeological supervision where there are impacts on the national heritage. The increase in volume of licences has risen dramatically from 487 in 1997 to approximately 2000 in last year. To meet this challenge the initial focus has been on the timely issue of licences so that archaeological excavations may be carried out within the timeframe of the relevant development project. In addition, codes of practice for the protection of the archaeological heritage were developed between the Department and bodies such as the National Roads Authority, Bord Gáis, the Irish Concrete Federation and Bord na Móna. These partnerships provide for best practice and consistent high standards in mitigating impacts on the archaeological heritage and in preserving sites in situ where possible. Indeed, much of the work of the archaeologists in the Department has been to protect sites from unnecessary interference by offering advice through the planning system. This has helped avoid damage to monuments and save costs in excavations.

On completion of an excavation, the archaeologist holding the licence is obliged to furnish a report to the Department. This report should include a full account of the stratigraphy features and finds including any specialist reports required. The reports are held by the Department and are accessible to the public for information and research. The Department also ensures that information on excavations is provided annually by contributing to the research, editing and publication of the Excavations Bulletin, which contains a summary report of all excavations carried out in Ireland in the relevant year. These summarised reports are available on a dedicated website which is also funded by the Department. Through these initiatives, the information gained from excavation is made available to the general public and specialists alike.

I want to see more progress in getting excavation reports submitted. I understand that the receipt of final reports from excavations is an issue, not only affecting Ireland, but also other countries — not that this should be an excuse to be complacent. The focus now, therefore, is not just on the timely issue of licences to ensure proper archaeological supervision of an excavation but also on the submission of reports. This year we will be initiating a number of improvements some of which involve contacting all licensed archaeologists regarding their outstanding reports——

Mr. J. Bruton

About time.

Mr. N. Ahern

—— the refinement of databases and archival material; the establishment of a new archaeology website to allow the full version of reports to be available electronically; and an external evaluation of the quality of reports.

Mr. J. Bruton

By whom?

Mr. N. Ahern

An external evaluation. I note the point raised by the Deputy as to whether the relevant expertise is available within the OPW. Here I am just referring to an external evaluation. I will look into what is happening internally within the OPW.

This initiative has resulted in the initial identification of just over 1,500 outstanding reports. However, the refinement of databases is likely to reduce that figure and the vigorous pursuit of outstanding reports will assist. I hear the Deputy's point about the background to this and what has happened within the two-month period. I agree with him that this information is important and that it is a cultural asset which will greatly assist our understanding of the past. I would stress that the fact, as the Deputy mentioned, that there are outstanding reports does not mean that excavations were not carried out by the necessary archaeological expertise. That is what we want evidence and proof of. I am confident that the situation will be much improved as a result of the proposed initiatives outlined above.

I agree that perhaps in the urgency to have the licensed system and have proper people doing the work, the follow-up was inadequate.

Mr. J. Bruton

My parliamentary question had an effect.

The Dáil adjourned at 5.30 p.m. until 2.30 p.m. on Tuesday, 17 February 2004.