asked the Minister for Health if he will state the approximate date for resumption of operations on the proposed tuberculosis sanatorium site at Abbotstown, Castleknock, County Dublin.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - County Dublin Sanatorium.
To remove any possible misconception as to the position in connection with works at the site of the proposed sanatorium at Abbotstown, County Dublin, I should perhaps say that work done on the actual site up to the present was limited to survey. The original decision as to numbers and types of patients to be accommodated required modification in view of the provision, at an earlier date than would be possible at Abbotstown, of accommodation at St. Mary's Hospital, Phoenix Park, and of the decision to provide separately for children at Ballyowen. The schedule of accommodation for Abbotstown has now been finally determined and the lay-out of the site is under active consideration. When the lay-out has been determined in the near future, the planning of the site works, including roads, water supply and drainage, can commence and it is hoped that these works will be under construction by the autumn.
The Deputy will appreciate that the sanatorium will be equivalent in size to a small town and will include a number of highly specialised buildings and services, the planning of which is necessarily slow.
Is that statement of the Minister's a confession of procrastination and delay?
In reply to the Deputy's supplementary, I do not quite know——
That in fact nothing has been done at Abbotstown notwithstanding what the Minister has been saying.
Exactly.
He did not put down pipes and have to take them up again.
When I took over my Department I found, both in regard to Abbotstown and another sanatorium in Cork at Sarsfield's Court, that very little progress had been made between 1945 and February, 1948. I found that it was undesirable to attempt to meet the very serious waiting list at that time—that is a year ago—by waiting for the regional sanatorium. Consequently, it was decided to proceed with a number of interim measures and to turn the whole forces of my Department on to the provision of these very necessary beds by other means than the regional sanatorium which had been neglected for three years. The Deputy, I am sure, will be glad to hear that the interim measures are proving very satisfactory indeed, and that beds are rapidly coming to hand.
Is it not a fact——
Question No. 106.
——that when the Minister took over——
Deputies
Order, order!
——he found the sanatorium which he has now scrapped.
In reply to the Deputy——
The Minister may not answer a question which should not have been asked.