Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 27 Mar 1985

Vol. 357 No. 4

Adjournment Debate. - Blanchardstown (Dublin) Hospital.

Dr. O'Hanlon

With the permission of the Chair I should like to share my time with Deputy Lenihan. There is general concern in the Blanchardstown area about the fact that there has not been any progress about building the hospital promised by the Minister's predecessors. Already the population of the catchment area is 112,000 and it is expected that in the Blanchardstown area, without going into north county Dublin and south Meath, that there will be 100,000 people by 1990. It is obvious that there is a need for this hospital. Since 1979 there has been a big increase in the volume of work carried out in the existing hospital. If one looks at attendances at the casualty department there one will see that there has been an increase from 12,500 in 1979 to 30,000 in 1984. Similarly, outpatient attendances have increased from 17,000 in 1979 to 35,000 in 1984. Due to the shortage of time for this debate I will not go into further statistics. However, I must express concern that the accident and emergency unit set up in 1982 has not been properly funded by the Department; in fact, the hospital last year had a deficit of over £500,000. I had a question down to the Minister today and it is obvious from the answer that there was no special allocation to the hospital for the accident and emergency department and that the hospital are obliged to fund that department out of their general allocation. When one considers that this hospital was built originally to accommodate tuberculosis patients and then changed into an acute medical hospital to serve the area but did not get the funding to ensure that it could operate as a general hospital, it is easy to see the difficulties it is facing in trying to provide the accident and emergency service.

Last year a 40 bedded unit was closed in the hospital and will remain closed for this year. This is an indication of the effects of the cutbacks on Blanchardstown Hospital. We appeal to the Minister to allocate sufficient funding to ensure that the hospital will continue to operate as a proper general hospital for the people in Blanchardstown and to proceed with the building of the new hospital to cater for the needs of the existing population of 112,000 and for the massive increase in population which is expected in the next ten years.

Mr. Lenihan

I should like to concentrate on one aspect within the limited time available to me, the failure on the part of the Minister to proceed with the appointment of a design team to carry out the development plan which is necessary to turn this hospital into a general, all purpose one, fully servicing the north western part of Dublin city and the part of County Meath adjacent to it. It should function as one of the six major hospitals in the greater Dublin area as originally planned by the Minister for Health in the Government to which I was glad to belong.

There is a lack of faith and an inability or incapacity to proceed with legitimate planning. I appreciate the straitened financial circumstances in which the Minister finds himself but he seems to take pleasure in inposing these financial stringencies. Units have been closed down, the hospital is running on a very thin personnel base and the accident and emergency units are working on a shoestring. However, the important aspect to which I should like to draw the Minister's attention is the question of not proceeding with the legitimate planning of the major hospital to which he committed himself. He wrote to me on 6 March 1984, over a year ago, stating specifically that the next stage in the development of the hospital would be the appointment of a team to prepare such a plan. We want the immediate appointment of a design team composed of essential, professional and medical expertise, to carry out the necessary design work so that when the financial situation improves — I am optimistic enough to think that it will under a Fianna Fáil Government — the Government of the day will be in a position to proceed with the implementation of the construction required on foot of the recommendations of the design team. I appreciate that planning takes time but it does not cost very much money and every month's delay in the appointment of the design team is a delay of a month in the commencement of the construction of a major hospital. If the Minister is going to proceed with the major hospital development, now is the time to engage in the comparatively inexpensive exercise of appointing a design team whose work will take about three years. If he does this, he will be giving an indication of his bona fides in this matter.

Minister for Health (Mr. B. Desmond)

Fianna Fáil Deputies in the Blanchardstown area arranged a public meeting and I would have thought that they would have shown more imagination coming up to local elections than by stirring up this matter. The meeting took place last Thursday in Coolmine and literature circulated contained a heading "Save Blanchardstown Hospital". The impression was given and I know that many people in the area thought that the hospital was going to close.

Dr. O'Hanlon

Two wards are closed already.

Mr. B. Desmond

I want to state categorically that there is no truth in that allegation. In the Department's current revenue accounts I have provided nearly £10 million to run the hospital in 1985. I condemn the Deputies opposite for causing needless anxiety among the population served by this hospital by these unfounded allegations.

I should like to refer to the proposed development of the hospital. The James Connolly Memorial hospital is designated as one of six major hospitals for the Dublin area and my Department are actively involved with the board of management. A very good friend of mine, Councillor Paddy Hickey, is a Fianna Fáil chairman, but he should have shown more discretion than getting embroiled in that kind of local party political play.

I am at present considering the capital allocation for the years 1985-1987 when the project can proceed to the next stage of planning of the complete redevelopment of the hospital in accordance with the planning brief which has been prepared. Pending that, I made moneys available to the hospital. I think I am the first Minister for Health in the past ten years to have done so. I made £150,000 available immediately last year for the extension of the accident and emergency and pathology departments. I visited the hospital and it is a very good one but the accident and emergency and pathology departments need development. To date we have spent £137,000 on development; the extension is nearly completed and the pathology department will open very shortly.

Mr. Lenihan

What about the design team?

Mr. B. Desmond

Misleading impressions have been given. Nobody has been declared redundant. The hospital is working at full stretch and the beds required——

Dr. O'Hanlon

Has a ward been closed?

Mr. B. Desmond

I am fully committed to the development of the James Connolly Memorial Hospital as a modern, acute general hospital and, for anybody to suggest otherwise, is quite untrue. This is an example of Fianna Fáil abusing our health services for personal, political gain. They should stop this and let us continue with the work. God knows, I have enough to do without coming into the House to deal with this kind of nonsense.

The Dáil adjourned at 9 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Thursday, 28 March 1985.