Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 11 Jul 2023

Vol. 1041 No. 6

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Leanann an farce faoi ospidéal náisiúnta na leanaí. Ní féidir leis an bhord a insint dúinn go fóill cén uair a bheas an t-ospidéal seo críochnaithe agus cén chostas deiridh a bheidh aige. Níl dabht ar bith ach go bhfuil gá leis an ospidéal seo a bheith foscailte do leanaí na hÉireann. Tá cuntasacht de dhíth fosta ón phobal agus na moilleanna agus na costais ag dul in airde agus in airde.

People are absorbing two serious scandals regarding taxpayers' money. The payment fiasco at RTÉ has dominated politics for weeks and the debacle of the construction of the national children's hospital deepens with costs that are out of control. Members of the hospital's development board will appear before the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Health tomorrow. Their opening statement is mind-blowing. It charts a farcical story of delay, massive cost overrun, a developer allowed to run amok and a government that has no control whatsoever over the construction of what will be one of the most expensive hospitals in the world.

At least €2 billion of taxpayers' money has been invested in this hospital and yet the board, the Government or the developer still cannot tell us when the doors will open and when the children of Ireland will be able to use the hospital. Nor can they tell us what the final bill will be. They say that the developer, BAM, has failed to deliver a contract programme that is compliant to deliver the hospital on time and on budget. We have zero clarity on the final cost of this project. The board has now submitted a further request to the Department for more money to get the hospital built. The board is writing cheques to BAM while at the same time expressing anger with BAM over how the developer is failing to deliver. It beggars belief. It is clear that nobody is in charge of the project and that it has become a runaway train.

The Minister for Health is clearly asleep at the wheel on the issue. Last week he made light of the concerns that I and my party raised regarding the design flaws in half of the hospital's operating theatres and the serious consequences this could have. We now learn from the board's opening statement that there is not one expert review, but two expert reviews into this same issue. Meanwhile the Government is happy just to stand on the sidelines, shrug the shoulders and say, "Sure, write another couple of cheques for another couple of hundred million; what does it matter?" The public looking on at this farce know they are being ripped off and know they are being taken for fools.

When the Taoiseach was Minister for Health this hospital was supposed to have cost us €650 million. It now has a price tag of €2 billion. Costs have more than trebled. We were supposed to have a national children's hospital years ago.

Then it became August 2022, then May 2024 and now the board says it cannot even guarantee that timeframe. Once again, the public is looking on and seeing a complete mess and a Government that is holding nobody to account for the mismanagement of hundreds of millions of euro of taxpayers' money.

The scandal at RTÉ and the debacle in relation to the national children's hospital are the outworking of that type of the insider culture of entitlement and that type of incompetence fostered by successive Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael governments down through the years. The broken culture we have here is the reason we have a housing emergency, our health services are creaking at the seams and countless young people are deciding to emigrate, believing they have been forced to do so. People want change. The Taoiseach can shake his head all he wants but young people are making the decision to leave because of this type of culture. They want change. They want better for themselves, their family and the children of this State. They want the children’s hospital built.

We have more than 100,000 children on hospital waiting lists and 290 children with scoliosis waiting for life-changing surgery. The Ombudsman pointed out that one of them who was waiting five years. That is a disgrace. The national children's hospital needs to be completed and opened for those children and many more.

My question is very simple. Will the Taoiseach tell us, as a former Minister for Health and current Taoiseach, when this hospital will open its doors to the public? Is he confident the May date the Minister gave just two weeks ago will be achieved? What is the final bill? Will he hold anybody to account for the fact costs have now tripled?

The Taoiseach

I thank the Deputy. The new children’s hospital will be an incredible state of the art hospital, one of the best in the world, and nobody will be sorry that it was built. When people see it and parents experience the treatments their children receive there, nobody will say it was not worth it. I guarantee the Deputy that. It will be Ireland’s first digital public hospital, with 380 individual en suite rooms with rooms for parents to stay overnight in each room, 60 critical care beds and 90 three-day beds.

There is a good deal of focus on the cost, which has been affected by Covid-19, the war in Ukraine and inflation. As Deputies know, delay is the biggest contributor to the cost and the project will take longer than planned and cost more than projected. Infrastructure projects like this are huge, complex and difficult. We see this in projects of this scale internationally but I reassure the House everything is being done to ensure the project is completed as soon as possible.

As things stand, the new hospital is 85% complete and the focus of works continues to be on internal fit-out and commissioning of mechanical and electrical services. Medical equipment is now also being installed. The elevated helipad, which will serve the children's hospital and St. James’s, is progressing to its final stages of assembly. Substantial completion is informed by the contractor’s programme and the last construction programme received from BAM, the contractor, suggested substantial competition could be achieved by March 2024. BAM has since revised this to May 2024. Once substantial competition is achieved, the hospital has to be handed over and there will be a period of months before it is fully commissioned.

To answer the Deputy’s question, we expect it to be completed and handed over next year and open to patients towards the end of next year, or early 2025 at the latest.

The budget for the hospital is €1.433 billion, of which €1.32 billion has been drawn down to date. That was the budget we agreed in 2018. It is clear, however, that the budget will have to be increased and that €1.433 billion will not be adequate. It is important to bear in mind that when people use the figure of €2 billion, which I hear a lot, it does not take account of a number of things, such as that the total cost is very much related to time, given the inflation clause. People also think that €2 billion figure applies only to the main campus at St. James’s but it does not. It also includes the urgent care centre in Blanchardstown, which is already open, running and operating well, as well as the urgent care centre in Tallaght, which is open and operating well. It includes the decommissioning of Crumlin and Temple Street.

It even includes the money that was spent on the failed attempt to build on the Mater site about 20 years ago. When people use the €2 billion figure, it is used in a misleading way.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

The Taoiseach's approach here is one of shrugging the shoulders and keep writing the cheques with no one held to account. That is why the public are outraged when they see this and why they are outraged by what they are seeing unfold in RTÉ. It is that type of insider culture. At the very heart of this is 100,000 children who are on waiting lists. There are 290 children with scoliosis who need life-changing operations and there is a hospital that was supposed to be built when the Taoiseach was Minister for Health and announced this project for €650 million. It has ballooned. It is out of control. The cheques just keep getting written and there is no accountability whatever. Two weeks ago we were hearing the completion date was March, then the Minister said it was still March and then a couple of days later it was May. Then we heard from the Taoiseach that it might be the end of the year and for the first time we are hearing that it might be 2025.

The problem at the core of this is that the Government does not have a clue what is happening with the national children's hospital. It cannot tell us how much it will cost and when it will be built. The one thing we know is that it is out of control. It was supposed to cost €650 million. We should have three national children's hospitals for the price we are paying for this one. No one is disputing we need it.

The board is telling us there is a go-slow going on with the national children's hospital and the Government is asleep at the wheel. Where is accountability going to come? Can the Taoiseach give us a final figure? Has he any confidence at all about when this hospital will open its doors to the people and the children of Ireland?

The Taoiseach

It is clear the cost of the hospital was substantially underestimated back in 2015 or 2016 at around €600 million. That was seven years ago. It is not a revelation to anyone that the hospital will take a lot more than the original €600 million estimate which was an underestimate at the time. We know what it costs now to build a massive hospital of this scale and it is a lot more than €600 million.

Deputy David Cullinane

We do not know.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Nobody knows. That is the problem.

An Ceann Comhairle

Please. Order.

The Taoiseach

To answer the Deputy's questions again, the hospital will be complete and handed over to the Government next year.

Deputy David Cullinane

When?

The Taoiseach

We would anticipate patients using the hospital in the latter part of next year or early 2025. I am confident that those time lines will be correct.

The budget allocated to the hospital is €1.433 billion. That is the budget allocated to it in 2018. It is going to cost more than €1.433 billion. Why do we not know how much more it will cost at this stage? First, the longer this goes on, the more it will cost to build because of the inflation clause in the contract and, second, we are standing up to the contractor. The contractor has put in many claims for additional money almost all of which we are fighting and almost all of which have been ruled in our favour.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

How much extra is the board looking for?

An Ceann Comhairle

I call Deputy Holly Cairns

Deputy Holly Cairns

Last night we were reminded of the excellent public service broadcasting work that RTÉ does. “RTÉ Investigates” spent five months researching and exposing what are cruel and inexcusable practices in part of our dairy sector. This is just one of the consequences of the unprecedented expansion since milk quotas were lifted in 2015 which has very predictably resulted in an explosion in the number of bull calves to 500,000 annually. It has resulted in them being treated as a waste product which is valueless and disposable.

Bull calves who survive beyond their first week and who are not killed in a yard or slaughter house routinely suffer terrible abuse. They are kicked, hit with sticks and thrown around by the tail, ears and legs at marts. When they are transported to Europe, they are packed into overcrowded lorries and endure journeys of more than 21 hours without even a drink of water.

How was this allowed happen? It is Government policy. Why have we had such an unsustainable expansion of dairy? It is Government policy. Why have cattle and diary been bred solely for dairy efficiency and away from dual breeding? It is a direct result of Department policy.

When pursing this policy of intensification and so-called efficiency, what was the plan for the obvious increase in bull calves?

As a county, we have always been so proud of our agricultural sector. It is the perception of Irish agriculture abroad that makes it so valuable. People perceive Ireland as a country that has grass-fed cattle, looks after its animals and so on. This scandal risks destroying all that, and not addressing it risks it even more. Most farmers agree that this is damaging and that we cannot tolerate a situation in which hundreds and thousands of calves are bred to suffer from their moment of birth.

I presume the Taoiseach accepts that we need to move away from live exports. There are some immediate steps we could take to do that. We need to incentivise the use of sexed semen. VAT on that could be removed. The Social Democrats had that proposal in our alternative budget last year. Obviously, however, a lot more than that needs to be done, including a re-examination of breeding practices where it is just for so-called efficiency. Clearly, existing laws on animal welfare need to be enforced. That, however, is not enough. Crucially, the Government needs to acknowledge that a change in approach from blindly driving the expansion and intensification of dairy is desperately needed, not least to protect the dairy sector but also to protect all other sectors, because it is that green brand that is so valuable to this country and our exports that has to be protected. Does the Taoiseach agree?

The Taoiseach

I strongly condemn any cruelty towards animals. The incidents in the clips shown by RTÉ were repugnant and have been widely condemned across the farming and dairy sectors. The Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine has sought the footage used in the programme to commence an investigation into these events. As Deputy Cairns rightly said, the reputation of the dairy and beef sector rests on complying with high standards of animal welfare, and the vast majority of farmers, processors and other workers have a strong commitment to ensuring animals are not mistreated. For sustainable dairy into the future, it is vital that dairy farmers continue to ensure high levels of calf care on farms and that all those working in the supply chain continue to support high standards of animal welfare, particularly at marts and during transport. Any incidents of such cruelty should be reported to the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine on its animal welfare helpline, and I assure the House that it will take robust and timely actions in response to any evidence of animal cruelty.

In response to the Deputy's question, connecting animal cruelty to the expansion of the dairy sector per se is a little simplistic. Sadly, there are people who will mistreat animals no matter how many animals there are, and that is the truth of it, just as there are truckers who will break the road safety rules, no matter what they are, and there are truckers who breach the road safety rules while carrying all sorts of things, not just cattle. These are people who are breaking the law and going against Government policy. It is the Government's animal welfare policy and laws they are breaking and the Government's road safety laws and policies they are breaking. The people who perpetrated this are therefore absolutely against Government policy and against the laws we pass in this House.

As regards the issue of sexed semen, which the Deputy mentioned, there has been an increase in the use of sexed semen, which allows dairy farmers to select appropriate breeding strategies for good-quality replacement dairy heifers and to focus on dairy calf breeding for the rest of their calves. Sexed semen now makes up about 20% of artificial insemination use, and we would like to see that increase. We recently announced a world-first genotyping programme, with an investment of €43 million over five years, to genotype cows and calves. That will give beef farmers accurate information on the commercial beef value of the dairy-beef calves they buy and will encourage dairy farmers to make more informed and better breeding decisions to produce better quality dairy-beef calves.

Deputy Holly Cairns

The investigation is very welcome and everyone agrees on that, but it will do nothing to move away from live exports. The Taoiseach might call it simplistic to say these incidents have resulted from the expansion of dairy, but it is also basic maths. We have had a massive increase in the number of cattle in the dairy herd and, therefore, a massive increase in the number of bull calves. The Taoiseach can call it simplistic, but it is true. This scandal is a direct consequence of Government policy that has pushed intensification and maximum production in the dairy sector. This failed model has also resulted in pollution of our pristine waterways, the degrading of our soil and an increase in our emissions. The Taoiseach's colleague, the Minister, Deputy Coveney, was Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine when milk quotas were lifted. In 2014, the year before that happened, he said the dairy industry had been operating under a straitjacket with the quota system.

He also stated categorically that he would not allow a situation where the potential for growth and expansion of agrifood would be compromised by the setting of emission limits. The mantra has always been "No limits". That is why we are having this conversation today. If the Government cannot acknowledge that, no one will have faith that it can address the issue either.

The Taoiseach

I do appreciate where the Deputy is coming from, but I really think she has got this wrong. She is making excuses for people who engage in animal cruelty and break the law. She is making excuses for hauliers and truckers who break our road safety laws and laws in other countries by driving their trucks without breaks.

Deputy Holly Cairns

Is that the best the Taoiseach can do?

The Taoiseach

The Deputy is making excuses for them, and I think that is the wrong approach.

Deputy Holly Cairns

When did I make excuses for them?

The Taoiseach

It does not matter if someone engages in animal cruelty - it is the Government's fault. It does not matter if a trucker does not take rest breaks - it is the Government's fault.

Deputy Holly Cairns

What does the Taoiseach think will happen to bull calves? What is the plan?

The Taoiseach

The Deputy should not make excuses for people who perpetrate cruelty against animals-----

Deputy Paul Murphy

You support the live export of calves.

An Ceann Comhairle

Deputy, please.

The Taoiseach

-----and she should not make excuses for truckers who breach our road safety rules. It is totally the wrong approach, Deputy.

Deputy Holly Cairns

When did I make excuses for them?

Deputy Jennifer Whitmore

That is an unfair representation.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

One of the reasons whoever is responsible for the scandal of RTÉ overpayments should be ashamed of themselves is because for three or four weeks now it has sucked all the air out of every other issue affecting ordinary people, who often struggle with intense hardship and difficulty in their lives. Before the Dáil finishes for the summer recess at the end of this week, one of the issues that has tragically been overshadowed by what is happening in RTÉ – what is happening in RTÉ is an important issue, do not get me wrong – is the most acute crisis that we continue to face. We now have more families, children and individuals in homelessness in the State than we have ever had on record at 12,441, a number that shamefully includes 3,699 children. Thousands more are facing the possibility of homelessness because of the Government’s decision to lift the eviction ban and its failure to provide public housing, affordable housing or some alternative when someone who has done nothing wrong is evicted. I feel compelled to remind the Government and the media on this last week of the Dáil that these issues need to be addressed and not forgotten as we head into the summer.

The residents of Tathony House were going to come to Leinster House today, but they are so stressed and depressed about their situation that, at the last minute, they could not bring themselves to do so. Their landlord is evicting them on grounds of sale. Despite the tenant in situ policy, he has ignored all contacts from Dublin City Council about the possibility of buying the apartment complex to stop those people being evicted. The Government said that it was going to bring in a first refusal policy to deal with what on the face of it is a landlord who was cruel and inhumane and who does not care about the stress, hardship, fear and terror that the families in Tathony House were suffering.

I have just heard of another case in Swords where people are being evicted from 47 homes, apparently on the grounds that their Part 4 tenancies are over. We are hearing from all over the place of councils finding excuses not to purchase properties where families are facing eviction. The latest reason is the fact that there are management fees in multi-unit complexes.

I ask that the Government, as an emergency measure, reinstates the eviction ban, introduces the first refusal policy as emergency legislation-----

An Ceann Comhairle

I thank the Deputy, but the time is up.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

-----and addresses the anomalies in the tenant in situ scheme to prevent more families being made homeless over the summer.

The Taoiseach

We had a Cabinet meeting today. I think there were 67 items on the agenda. I can absolutely guarantee the Deputy that more of those items were about housing than about RTÉ and that we as a Government spend a lot more time concerned about the housing crisis than we do about RTÉ, important as that issue is. I am happy to reassure the Deputy of that.

With regard to housing, this morning the Government published its report for the second quarter of 2022 on the progress that has been made to put right the housing crisis in this country, which is deep and affecting people in lots of different ways. The report shows the number of new homes being built has increased, as has the number of commencements. The number of planning permissions has increased by 40% on the first quarter of last year. The pipeline is very strong. Every week, 700 first-time buyers get mortgage approval. This is the highest since records began. The figure of 400 or 500 first-time buyers every week is the highest in 15 years. More social housing is being built than at any time since 1975. We are increasingly confident that we will beat and exceed our housing targets for this year. That is 29,000 new homes, plus student accommodation plus derelict homes being brought back into use. Today we announced new fund of €150 million to enable more local authorities to buy properties, refurbish them for residential purposes, sell them on and use that money to buy other properties. A lot of progress is being made but I do not for a second argue that it is enough or that there is not a lot more we need to do.

The really dark end and the most difficult end of the housing crisis is, of course, homelessness. There are roughly 12,000 people in State-provided emergency accommodation at present. We are helping in lots of different ways. We are ramping up social housing, as I mentioned earlier. We have the homeless housing assistance payment to help people find a place in the private market sector. There is also the tenant in situ scheme, which has approximately 2,000 properties in process to be purchased by the Government from landlords so the people living in those properties can become regular social housing tenants, something I know Deputy Boyd Barrett supports and has advocated many times. It is something that is now happening at scale. I do not know why it cannot be done in Tathony House. I will look into it. It is a potential solution.

We are lifting more people out of homelessness than ever before. That figure is rarely spoken about or published. More people are being lifted out of homelessness by the Government than ever before. Unfortunately, there are many reasons people become homeless. They are not always under the control of the Government. There is family breakdown. Increasingly, there are people from overseas who are not Irish citizens. A total of 40% of those in emergency accommodation are people who are not Irish citizens, many of whom are not even entitled to social housing. It is a much more complicated picture than many would suggest.

In relation to the question on the eviction ban, we do not intend to reinstate it. When it was in place, it did not work. The number of people in emergency accommodation increased nearly every month it was in place. Yes, it has continued to rise since then but still at a similar rate. People argue this but it is 1% or 2% a month. Obviously, we want to see it go the other way but it did not work.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

Promises of things in the future are cold comfort to families who are homeless now with their children, in many cases for several years, or those threatened with homelessness immediately. This week a woman who came to my office was bawling crying because she felt she had let down her daughter. She is working, by the way, as are many who are homeless or threatened with homelessness. The problem with what the Taoiseach has just said is that he has no solution for her or her children, or for many others. Last week I raised the case of a woman who is working for a State agency. She has been in homeless accommodation for four years. She cannot afford the rents out there and she over the threshold for social housing. There is nothing for her. She is rotting in homeless accommodation.

I support the tenant in situ scheme and I advocated for its establishment. However, there are councils throughout the country that are looking for every excuse not to use it. The latest is because there are management fees. One council will say that management fees are not a problem but another council will say they are a reason not to use it. At the Business Committee I asked that the Government would address these issues before the summer recess. Real individuals, families and children - not statistics - will end up homeless over the summer months if these issues are not addressed as a matter of urgency.

The Taoiseach

I thank the Deputy. Anybody having to spend a prolonged period in emergency accommodation is unacceptable and undesirable. The vast majority of people who are provided with emergency accommodation by the State are there for less than the year. For very many it is for in and around six or seven months.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

Two and a half years and four years.

The Taoiseach

I have come across plenty of cases of people who were there for prolonged periods of time, such as three years or four years, just like the Deputy, but there is often a more complicated story behind it.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

There is no complicated story.

The Taoiseach

I do not know about the case Deputy has mentioned but there have been plenty of cases in my constituency where people who have been in emergency accommodation for two years or three years have turned down multiple offers of accommodation.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

That is not the case.

The Taoiseach

That might not be the case in the context of the matter the Deputy raised, but it is the case. We should factor it into our statistics-----

Deputy Paul Murphy

Blame the victims.

The Taoiseach

-----because it is not the case that all those 12,000 people have not been offered permanent accommodation; very many have.

In terms of the options for people who do not qualify for social housing, we have an option. It is cost rental, which is a new form of public housing created by the previous Government and being realised by this Government.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

It is a tiny amount.

The Taoiseach

It is being scaled up every day.

Deputy Matt Shanahan

Frank McDonald, writing in The Irish Times, recently outlined the continuing dominance of spending and resource concentration in Dublin and its surrounds, to the detriment of the other regions. The article states: "We are sleepwalking our way towards a deeply dysfunctional, inequitable and unbalanced Ireland." The allocation of capital resources to Waterford is a clear reflection of that image. The endemic failure to resource Waterford as the regional driver for the south east is all too easily illustrated. For example, despite the hype relating to the university, no new visible investment in teaching buildings in Waterford has taken place in the past 20 years. The vaunted purchase of the Waterford Crystal site and the promised engineering building remain purely aspirational. The primary routes from Waterford to Cork and Limerick have remained devoid of upgrade for more than two decades. In the period 2019 to 2021, IDA Ireland site visits for the entire country totalled 558. Waterford was the subject of just 6% of those visits. In fact, just 30% of the visits were directed to Cork, Limerick and Galway. In two years, GDP in the south east has fallen by 20% while the economic juggernaut that is Dublin rolls on.

Surpassing this, it is in acute healthcare that discrimination in capital resourcing is most evident and egregious, as is the political gaslighting that comes with it. Replies to recent parliamentary questions I tabled outline that from 2013 to today, capital allocations to University Hospital Waterford, UHW, were just 45% of the budgets given to its peer regional hospitals in Limerick, Cork and Galway. That figure includes the Dunmore wing, the palliative ward and the new cath lab so often referenced by the Government in the House. Despite the continuous underfunding and having the lowest employee headcount of its peers, UHW still outperforms all others, even with the surge of patients from Wexford redirected there. Officially, its emergency department has been the busiest in the State since March and it continues to be an exemplar in emergency care key performance indicators,.

Knowing this, why did the Government see fit to award between €54 million and €94 million each to the other eight model 4 regional hospitals in the HSE's 2023 capital development plan while completely excluding UHW from accessing one red cent of funding from the national acute spending programme? Could it be because Waterford lacks the Cabinet seat required to drive investment along the VIP lane reserved for Minsters' pet projects? If that is not the case, understanding that there have been ten years of discriminatory spending injustice, as I have laid out and as evidenced by replies to parliamentary questions and the research of Frank McDonald and many economists, can the Taoiseach outline why the Government's spending decisions for Waterford are always wrong while those for him and his Cabinet colleagues are always right?

The Taoiseach

If the Deputy looks back over the past ten or 20 years, there has been very considerable public and Government investment in the south east. There is the motorway to Waterford, the New Ross road, the Enniscorthy bypass, the Viking Triangle and the Waterford greenway, also know as the Déise greenway. The long-promised South East Technological University is now a reality. There have been major port investments in Belview and a major one about to happen in Rosslare. Money was offered to the airport in Waterford for its further expansion. The north quays project is a huge investment to transform Waterford city and allow it to grow in a compact and sustainable manner. There is also the Abbey quarter in Kilkenny, and major IDA Ireland investments in Wexford, Waterford and Kilkenny. There has been a great deal of Government investment in the region.

As regards the hospital specifically, under this Government in the past three years, the budget for UHW has increased by 30%, staffing levels by 23% and there has been more than €90 million in capital investment. There is more to come. The Minister for Health, Deputy Donnelly, met with the leadership team from the hospital last Friday to discuss future investment. Already, as the Deputy mentioned, with the Dunmore wing, there are an additional 60 beds, the second cath lab is due to open in September and there is the palliative care centre. Very much on the agenda now is the new surgical hub. Waiting lists are already falling in Waterford. We think they will fall faster once the surgical hub is up and running. As the Deputy rightly pointed out, notwithstanding the enormous additional pressure because of Wexford hospital being closed temporarily, the emergency department in Waterford is still performing relatively well. There is a lot more investment in the pipeline and I am determined to do anything I can to help push that through.

That will include the laboratory extension, a new outpatient department vertical extension, additional day ward beds at the second cardiac centre laboratory and a new additional mental health unit. In the medium term, there is also a proposed new ward block containing 160 beds.

Deputy Matt Shanahan

The figures relating to the underfunding of the region are stark. On the hospital, I remind the Taoiseach that despite the increases in revenue to the operating budget that he outlined and the capital grants, it is still the least resourced of all the nine model 4 hospitals in the country. Yet, its emergency department has been the busiest in the country since March. If the Taoiseach looks at the investment that has been given in the 2023 capital development plan, the allocation to Waterford represents less than one third of the moneys given to University Hospital Galway, Cork University Hospital, and University Hospital Limerick in an 11-year period. That is the stark reality no matter how it is dressed up. I accept the Taoiseach's bona fides in that he is keen to move things along. However, we have a dysfunctional procurement system in terms of trying to deliver these projects. In that context, there is no allocation in the capital plan for UHW in the context of design and build specifications to UHW in the capital plan. People from RTÉ are in the Oireachtas at the moment talking about dysfunction, shining a light and achieving new levels of governance. I honestly believe that we need to start looking at the Department of Health and the HSE in terms of the inequitable allocation of resources to Waterford and the south east.

The Taoiseach

I thank the Deputy for his question. What I meant to say earlier is that, as Taoiseach and as a former Minister for Health, I have had the benefit of visiting hospitals regularly. It is something I make a point of doing. I visited Castlebar recently and Waterford not too long ago. I have been to Limerick many times. Almost every hospital or region makes the case that they are the most underfunded. They cannot all be right.

Deputy Matt Shanahan

From the replies to my parliamentary questions, we are right.

The Taoiseach

It is often about the way it is calculated. People will calculate things in a different and particular way. As I said earlier, under this Government €91 million has been invested in the hospital so far. That includes the construction of the new outpatient department, OPD, with 16 consulting rooms, four virtual consulting rooms and two minor procedure rooms. That was completed in quarter 1 of this year and it has been opened. In the pipeline is the lab extension, the OPD extension and the additional day beds for the cath lab, which are crucially important as the Deputy will agree. Beyond that are the new adult mental health unit and the new ward block. I am determined to get those projects moving. I have sought from the Department of Health a list of projects that are shovel-ready, in respect of which there is planning permission and that could go to tender. I do not have that yet. As soon as I get it, I will engage with Minister for Health and the Minister for Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform, Deputy Donohoe, in order to see if there are projects in respect of which planning permission has been obtained but that have stalled for some reason. We will get them moving.

An Ceann Comhairle

I thank the Taoiseach. That concludes Leader's Questions. Before we move to the Order of Business, the Taoiseach has a brief comment he wishes to make.

The Taoiseach

Very briefly, I wanted to note on the record of the House the sad passing of a former Deputy, Mr. Ben Briscoe. He was somebody who would have been known to many of us down the years. He served as a Deputy for Dublin. He was also Lord Mayor in 1988 for the wonderful Dublin millennium year. He will be sadly missed by his friends, colleagues and, of course, by the wider Fianna Fáil Party. He gave a lifetime of service to politics and to Dublin. For that, we are grateful.

An Ceann Comhairle

I thank the Taoiseach for those remarks. I and hope we will have an occasion in the future to pay tribute.