Adjournment Debate.

Hospital Services.

Deputy Seymour Crawford

I wonder where is the Minister for Health and Children. Is there anyone from the Department of Health and Children in the Chamber who cares about the health of the people of Monaghan? Today, meetings are taking place between management and staff regarding further winding down of services at Monaghan General Hospital. Some 48 nurses, 42 non-clinical staff, 22 administration staff and 18 support staff are to be redeployed. Most doctors will be redeployed or will go and the hospital, where €14 million has been spent in the past few years, will be restructured into a rehabilitation centre. Two thirds of the services and staff are being removed.

In the past week we have seen the anger of ordinary people at the treatment of over 70s by this Government. The Minister for Health and Children and the Fianna Fáil-led Government has done a partial U-turn regarding the medical card for most but not all. Is it fair that these will be the group of people to suffer most from the proposed withdrawal of Monaghan General Hospital from the public service? That the service will no longer be available in Monaghan and that they must pay transfer costs to Cavan or Drogheda means that people will delay going for treatment where possible, until it is much more serious and may even lead to death. At this late stage, I beg the Minister to ignore more highly paid experts from London and listen to the consultants and staff at Monaghan General Hospital. Can the Minister of State advise me as to the difference between the elderly and the sick in County Roscommon who voted for the Minister of State, Deputy Finneran, and the families who voted in County Monaghan? Are the taxpayers of County Roscommon more important than those of County Monaghan?

Is it not time that the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney, or some senior person on her behalf, looked at the excellent refurbishment work that has been carried out, not only on the two active wards in Monaghan General Hospital but also at the one that was recently closed? In the accident and emergency room patients are dealt with more quickly than in most others in Ireland and there is also the partially used state-of-the-art theatre.

I appreciate that the Minister of State, Deputy Conor Lenihan, and his colleagues have apologised openly in the Dáil to the elderly people of Ireland for their ill-informed actions regarding medical cards. I have been told that some Ministers actually had tears in their eyes. They should remember the 17 patients who died when Monaghan General Hospital was off-call before. I beg the Minister of State, his ministerial colleagues and his colleagues in Government to end the stupidity of closing down Monaghan General Hospital while there is no alternative. They would avoid having the deaths of future patients on their hands if not on their consciences.

I have the document in my hand that we were given only a few minutes ago. That is the courtesy we, as Members of the Oireachtas, were afforded.

Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin

This afternoon the Health Service Executive informed 130 staff that they will no longer be employed in Monaghan General Hospital and are to be redeployed. The HSE has confirmed that the final removal of all acute medical services from this hospital will take place in late January or early February 2009. In other words, the HSE has confirmed the death sentence for Monaghan General Hospital. A hospital which has provided care to generations of people will be no more.

The Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney, her Fianna Fáil colleagues in Government, the HSE and above all, the Fianna Fáil Oireachtas Members for Cavan-Monaghan should hang their heads in shame. They have betrayed the people and have allowed vital services to be taken away with grave consequences for the health and the very lives of the people of County Monaghan. This will be a devastating blow to the people of that county and will be a major reduction in overall hospital services in the entire north-east region. It is the culmination of years of attrition by the Government and the HSE during which time service after service was taken from the hospital. The HSE has stated that once a medical assessment unit opens in Cavan General Hospital in late November or early December, the transfer of acute medical services from Monaghan to Cavan will happen within two months.

There are currently 3,000 acute medical admissions to Monaghan General Hospital per annum. If the HSE plan goes ahead, by the beginning of February 2009 this service must be provided by Cavan General Hospital where not one single additional acute hospital bed will be provided. The plan outlined to staff today by the HSE makes no mention of the location of additional accident and emergency ambulance cover in Monaghan town, as promised by the HSE. In a letter to me of 3 September, the HSE lists measures that must be in place prior to the centralisation of acute inpatient services at Cavan General Hospital. These included an additional 24-hour emergency ambulance at a Monaghan ambulance station, an increase of one, or 50%, from two to three ambulances. When I learned from sources within the HSE that the promised extra ambulance service may not be located in Monaghan town the HSE failed to deny this and confirmed that other locations were being considered.

Our hospital is to be closed and we do not even have a guarantee that we will be provided with the ambulance service which the HSE stated was vital. The removal of services from Monaghan General Hospital has already caused the deaths of patients. I have no doubt that the closure of the hospital will lead to considerable inconvenience, totally unnecessary suffering and, in some cases, the avoidable deaths of patients.

On the floor of this Chamber today I accuse the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, Deputy Brendan Smith, the Fianna Fáil Deputies, Rory O'Hanlon and Margaret Conlon, and Senators Diarmuid Wilson and Francis O'Brien of betraying the people of counties Monaghan and Cavan whom they were elected to represent. Thanks to these Fianna Fáil time servers who failed to confront their Government on a life and death issue, health care in County Monaghan is to be devastated while Cavan General Hospital will be forced to cope with a considerable additional workload of patients without the additional resources required.

However late in the day it may be, I call on these people and on all others with positions of influence, to contact the Taoiseach, Deputy Cowen, the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney, the HSE and the local Fianna Fáil Oireachtas Members and local authority representatives, not only in counties Cavan and Monaghan but throughout the region in a last minute 11th hour appeal. It is not too late to get a conscience about this issue.

Minister of State at the Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs (Deputy Conor Lenihan)

I will be taking this matter on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Mary Harney.

The Teamwork report, prepared for the Health Service Executive clearly indicated that the service configuration in the north-east region was unsustainable. It recommended a reconfiguration of hospital services across the existing five hospital sites in order to ensure the highest level of patient safety. The report also identified a significant future role for all five hospital sites in the provision of acute hospital services.

The report has helped to inform the approach being adopted by the HSE to the implementation of its transformation programme. The programme involves widespread and fundamental change and is designed to build a health system that is in line with the model of care emerging internationally. The overriding aim, which the Minister fully supports——

Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin

That is rubbish, absolute rubbish.

Deputy Conor Lenihan

——is the need to improve safety and achieve better standards of care for patients in the region.

Deputy Seymour Crawford

To increase death.

Deputy Conor Lenihan

As part of the reconfiguration of acute hospital services in the north east the HSE has previously indicated that it plans to transfer acute inpatient services from Monaghan to Cavan and to develop additional services at Monaghan.

Deputy Seymour Crawford

Where are the beds?

Acting Chairman

The Minister should continue.

Deputy Conor Lenihan

Options that will be explored with staff over the coming weeks will be the following — redeployment to immediate funded vacancies in the acute hospitals and to primary, continuing and community care in the north east; career support and up-skilling of certain staff where appropriate; transfer to some immediate service vacancies, for example, the medical assessment unit in Cavan General Hospital; posts to support the delivery of the packages of care and additional posts to accommodate the 37.5 hour working week.

A proposed framework has been put together by the HSE in order to facilitate the above and this will be discussed with the union and staff representative bodies.

Deputy Seymour Crawford

If the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney, were transferred it would be a lot better.

Schools Refurbishment.

Deputy Joanna Tuffy

St. Brigid's national school for girls in Palmerstown, Dublin 20, featured in news reports recently because it was not included on the list of schools building projects announced by the Minister of Education and Science, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, several weeks ago, despite an assurance being given by a Minister that the project would be included on the list. It is almost ten years since the school authorities applied to have the school modernised and upgraded.

St. Brigid's national school is housed in an old building constructed in the 1950s. Since the construction of a flat-roof extension in the 1970s, no further substantial works have taken place in the school. The original application for works was made in 1999 and the proposed project proceeded to design stage in 2000. A design team estimated the project would be completed in May 2003. New plans were submitted in 2005 on foot of a request by the Department made in 2004. The authorities were informed at that point that the plans would be assessed as a priority project. In 2006, the Department wrote to the school authorities indicating that the project was long overdue and badly needed. Although the site was ready for construction in 2007, the project did not feature on the most recent list of school building projects announced a couple of weeks ago.

Students at the school must contend with an old fashioned, inadequate heating system which broke down in March last year. As a result of this breakdown, one of the teachers spent Monday mornings mopping the floors, affixing gas cylinders to heaters and telephoning a plumber to beg that he repair the boiler. In addition, teachers were unable to cook or heat foods at lunchtime because electrical sockets would blow due to increased demand. The school also had to hire expensive gas heaters at a cost of €700 because it could no longer heat the school.

A sum of €750,000 has been spent on consultation fees and moving prefabricated buildings from one site to another as part of the project. The prefabricated buildings on the site cost the Department €10,000 per month to rent. Clearly, putting the project on the long finger does not make economic sense.

Teachers and students must avoid water dripping from ceilings and run from prefabricated buildings to the main building between classes. As running water is not available in classrooms, water must be brought into classrooms in buckets if it is required under the curriculum. Health and safety issues arise for teachers and pupils. The buildings have mould, mildew and dry rot and make for a poor learning environment. The cost of heating the prefabs is substantial and the school is too cold in winter and too warm in summer. In addition, there are insufficient classrooms.

St. Brigid's is an excellent school and community facility. The teachers and pupils, who try their best in the circumstances, have been fighting for the refurbishment project for years. Having been promised the project would proceed before the 2002 and 2007 elections, they have learned that it is still on the long finger. In this day and age, it makes no sense to place pupils and teachers in conditions akin to those described by Dickens. The alleged objective of the Government is to have more sustainable public buildings to address climate change. The school buildings in St. Brigid's national school are inefficient and wasteful of energy because the Department has refused to invest the money required for the refurbishment project. The project should be a Government priority.

Deputy Conor Lenihan

I thank the Deputy for raising this matter as it provides me with the opportunity to outline to the House the position with regard to the proposed building project for St. Brigid's national school, Palmerstown, Dublin 20.

St. Brigid's national school is a fully vertical, all-girls school, which means it caters for pupils from junior infants to sixth class, inclusive. It has a current enrolment of 399 pupils. Enrolment at the school has decreased by 12% over the past five years. The school has a staffing level of a principal, 15 mainstream teachers and five special education teachers. The board of management of the school has applied to the Department for large-scale capital funding for an extension and refurbishment project. The brief for the proposed project is to upgrade and extend the existing accommodation. The upgrade will include the replacement of all windows, flat roof remediation and mechanical and electrical works

The additional accommodation being provided will comprise 739 sq. m., which will include the provision of general classrooms and enhanced staff facilities. The proposed project is at stage six of the architectural planning process, which is tender action stage. The tender report was submitted to the Department in November 2007.

As the Minister has indicated in the House many times, the Department must prioritise how it spends its capital funding to ensure it is first targeted at areas and schools most in need. To enable this, each application is assessed against published prioritisation criteria for large-scale building projects. These criteria were formulated following consultation with the education partners. Under the criteria, each application, once assessed to determine the level and type of need presenting, is assigned a band rating. Projects are progressed from the initial design stages through to tender and construction commensurate with the band rating assigned to them and as funding is available.

The project for St. Brigid's national school has been assigned a band 2 rating, the second highest band rating possible. Higher band 1 rated projects address accommodation needs in rapidly developing areas where either no accommodation exists or the existing accommodation is not sufficient to meet the needs of a growing population. It also addresses the provision of accommodation for special needs pupils, structurally unsound buildings and the provision of accommodation to underpin rationalisations.

Given the extent of the demand on the Department's capital budget for projects in these categories, it is not possible for the Department to give an indicative timeframe as to when the project for St. Brigid's national school can be approved to proceed further. The Department's capital allocation for next year will amount to more than €581 million which will allow it to continue to invest significantly in school buildings throughout the country, provide additional school places, refurbish existing schools and invest in higher education infrastructure.

The Deputy will appreciate that it is only possible to meet all the school accommodation needs incrementally and over time and that an orderly and structured manner is critical to ensuring the most urgent needs are met first. This is ensured by the implementation of the prioritisation criteria which the Minister has outlined.

The Minister assures the Deputy that the progression of the project for St. Brigid's national school will be considered in this context and as the necessary funding becomes available. Again, I thank the Deputy for providing me with the opportunity to address the House on this matter and outline the current position.

Departmental Funding.

Deputy Olivia Mitchell

I tried this morning to have the Dáil adjourned to have this matter discussed. While it was not agreed to do so, I appreciate the opportunity to raise it on the Adjournment. The budget measure cutting school services grants has the most serious implications not only for the children it will affect directly but for virtually all Protestant faith schools, some of which may have to close, and, more seriously, for the future of the Protestant community. I do not exaggerate in making that statement.

The support services grant withdrawn by the current Government was the direct result of a formal agreement between the former Minister for Education, Mr. Donogh O'Malley, and Church of Ireland bishops representing all Protestant faith schools. The agreement was made prior to the introduction of free education in the 1960s. This special grant was in recognition of the fact that the State could not provide appropriate education to Protestant faith children because such children were few in number and the Protestant community was dispersed. Existing schools needed to be boarding schools for the same reasons and could not participate in the free education scheme introduced by the then Minister. Until the most recent budget, this agreement had been honoured by successive Governments through the decades.

The agreement copper-fastened an understanding, dating back to the foundation of the State, that the new State would always respect and facilitate the education of the minority Protestant communities. For the Minister to refer to this agreement now as a mere anomaly is hurtful and insulting and does not reflect the provenance of the agreement nor the ongoing need for it.

The Minister may be of the view that this grant is somehow a subsidy to the children of the former landed gentry. Nothing could be further from the truth. The sum involved is small — a mere €2.8 million annually — and is administered by the secondary education committee on behalf of all Protestant faith schools. It is used exclusively to allow disadvantaged children attend a school with an ethos appropriate to their faith. As the majority of Protestant faith schools are fee-paying, in effect the grant is used to provide a subsidy to families unable to pay the higher fees inevitably associated with small schools and boarding schools. Most of them are boarding schools.

The implications of losing the grant are clear. Disadvantaged children will not be able to attend the school of their parents' choice and these schools will, in many cases, simply become untenable and ultimately have to close, with all the consequences that has for the long tradition of Protestantism on this island. Many of these schools have been in existence for hundreds of years. I am sure the Minister, although he is now in China, does not want to go down in history as the one who closed them.

Protestant faith schools are facing all of the same cuts as other schools as a result of the budget. On top of this they are being further penalised by the unilateral, arbitrary and utterly ill-conceived withdrawal of this longstanding grant. Given the history of our island and the recognition of that history and tradition as regards how schools and education have been funded and delivered since the foundation of the State, this move is high handed, insulting and does not reflect the wishes of either the majority or the minority.

I cannot believe the Minister, in referring to this grant as an "anomaly", had been briefed on either its provenance or purpose. I believe it might have been foisted on him by a Department in search of easy targets to cut. However, he now knows its history and I ask that this cut be reversed immediately. At €2.8 million it is really a paltry sum in the context of the overall budget and certainly the saving does not justify the offence and damage this will cause to the minority community.

Deputy Conor Lenihan

I am pleased to be given the opportunity, on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, to clarify the position in relation to the withdrawal of certain grants from Protestant fee-paying schools.

The statement by the Minister, Deputy O'Keeffe, on the budget made it clear that the Protestant block grant remains in place. For that reason, the Minister was surprised by the comments attributed to the Archbishop of Dublin concerning the agreement referred to by the Deputy. In addition to the block grant, Protestant fee-paying schools were paid a range of support services grants that the Catholic fee-paying schools did not receive. These grants were not available at the time of the agreement with the representatives of the Protestant faith schools and therefore the Minister is not breaking any formal agreement. The purpose of these grants was not to offset fees for disadvantaged Protestant students. It is estimated that savings of €2.8 million will accrue as a result of the withdrawal of these grants from the Protestant fee-paying schools in 2009.

There are 56 fee-charging second level schools in the State, of which 21 are Protestant, two inter-denominational, one Jewish, and the balance of 32 are Catholic. The Deputy has expressed concern regarding the effect the withdrawal of the support services grant will have on access by disadvantaged students of the Protestant faith to schools reflecting the Protestant ethos. The Minister wishes to re-emphasise that there are no changes proposed in respect of the Protestant block grant. Protestant fee-paying schools receive, and will continue to receive, the Protestant block grant, which in the current school year amounts to €6.25 million. This payment covers capitation, tuition and boarding grants.

The grant is distributed by the Secondary Education Committee among needier Protestant children. Applications are made by parents to the Central Protestant Churches Authority, which, on the basis of a means test, distributes the funds to individual schools on the basis of pupil needs. The retention of this grant demonstrates the importance the Minister for Education, and this Government, continue to attach to ensuring that students of the Protestant faith can attend schools that reflect their denominational ethos.

The decision to remove these grants came against the backdrop of a difficult international economic situation. It was inevitable in these circumstances that the education budget for 2009 should include a number of measures that will involve curtailing expenditure. However, the Minister cannot agree with the Deputy's assertion that their removal will affect access by disadvantaged Protestant students to fee-paying schools, as this access remains protected through the Protestant block grant.

Once again I want to thank the Deputy for providing me with the opportunity to address the House on this matter and to outline the current position.

Schools Building Projects.

Deputy James Reilly

I thank the Acting Chairman for allowing me to speak on this Adjournment Debate and the Minister of State for coming in to discuss it. As the father of young children, he will appreciate the seriousness of this matter.

The school at Hedgestown in Lusk, north County Dublin, was built in the 1940s and extended in the 1960s. These buildings are what might be described as "pre-fab" in type, although they are not prefabricated. They are unfit for any purpose at this stage and have been acknowledged as such by the Department of Education and Science which promised a new school in February this year, as the school board accepted. Nonetheless, no works have taken place. This is all the more difficult to understand given that the school had purchased a site across the road and was making it available to the Department.

I shall now turn to the gravity of the situation. This school has an asbestos roof. Below the roof is a suspended ceiling with what is commonly referred to as rock wool, for insulation. The tiles on the school floor are also asbestos, as are the drains and the pipes. What happened here was extremely frightening for children and staff. The roof collapsed over half the classroom, between the students and the only door that acts as an exit. It was by the grace of God that no one was seriously injured. The children had great difficulty in getting out of the classroom, as did the teachers, following the collapse of the roof.

I visited the school, met the principal and saw the state of the room. It was just extraordinary. One must remember these are primary school children, aged eight to ten, who were terrified. Looking around the room, one saw the suspended ceiling falling all over the place and rock wool interspersed with rodent faeces. Thankfully, the school has been closed and arrangements have been made to move the students to Educate Together in Lusk. It is extraordinary, however, that it is now planned to re-roof and re-tile the existing school at enormous cost to the taxpayer when a new school was promised and the site is available. Surely the Minister of State must admit it makes more sense to build the new school now with pre-modular units that could be onsite and commissioned in six months.

Furthermore, the Department has given a grant of only €50,000 to carry out the repairs, whereas at a minimum it will cost €120,000 as well as architects' fees — and that is being conservative. Since the roof is asbestos, they are now monitoring the asbestos levels in the air and clearly all children have been removed from the school. These works will take five to six weeks to complete and in the meantime children will have to be transported to the new school. However, agreement must be reached on a location from which they will be collected and I hope we will get co-operation and that the Department will provide the necessary insurance for any carpark that might be used for this purpose.

The new facility is to be an eight-classroom school, but surely as an interim measure a four-classroom school could be built, with a PE room in phase 1, and phase 2 being built thereafter. There are 92 children enrolled at the moment, most of whom are out of the school. Certainly, some of the classes have gone and cannot return. The entire school is closed and children cannot be collected from there because of the asbestos problem, which has yet to be clarified. Some 92 children will be enrolled next year, 104 the year after and 106 the following year.

This is a growing area, as alluded to by the Minister of State in one of his earlier responses. There is very little sense, in my view, in expending further taxpayers' money on a time-expired building built partly in the 1940s and partly in the 1960s, when within four months and for a little extra money a new school could be put in place. I understand these modular units are merely leased from the providers and therefore would not represent huge capital outlay.

I hope the Minister of State can reassure the children, parents and teachers of Hedgestown school, which caters for many pupils from all around north County Dublin, including Balrothery, Lusk, Rush, Naul, Man-o'-War, Walshestown and Balbriggan, that a new school can be provided. Otherwise what we are facing is disruption for the students while they are being transported over and back to Educate Together in Lusk, only to move back into this unsatisfactory situation and have to move again later. It seems to be waste of the State's resources as well as the children's and parents' time.

I hope the Minister of State will be able to tell the House that, rather than having this interim measure, these children having been subjected to the shock of the roof falling in on them, will be facilitated, put to the top of the queue and given priority for their new school. This should take place as expeditiously as possible so that they can move straight from Educate Together back to a new school.

Having spoken to some of the parents today, my understanding is that if the Department acts other than expeditiously, there could be other consequences, perhaps of litigious nature, which I would find regrettable. I thank the Minister of State for coming to the House to take the Adjournment and I look forward to his response.

Deputy Conor Lenihan

I thank the Deputy for raising this matter as it provides me with the opportunity to outline to this House the position with regard to the incident which occurred at Hedgestown national school, Lusk, County Dublin, last week and the Department's plans to provide a new building for the school.

Hedgestown national school is a fully vertical co-educational facility. This means that it caters for boys and girls from junior infants to sixth class, inclusive. The enrolment as at 30 September 2008 was 82 pupils. The school has a current staffing of a teaching principal, three mainstream class teachers, one language support teacher and one learning support teacher.

The existing school building is currently located on a sloped site of less than 0.5 acres. The school has three permanent classrooms and the Department is grant-aiding the rental of a prefabricated mainstream classroom and resource rooms. The Department also sanctioned the purchase of a prefab this year to meet the school's September 2008 needs.

A ceiling collapse in the school was reported to the Department last week. The Department immediately notified the incident to the Health and Safety Authority and it advised the school to do likewise. A senior member of the Department's professional staff visited the school to assess the situation and to make recommendations on the works that would be needed to address the problem. A member of the Health and Safety Authority also visited the school.

Following the recommendations of the Department's professional and technical staff, the board of management was informed that the Department will provide the school with the funds to carry out the necessary remediation works and to employ a suitably qualified consultant to advise the board of management on and to oversee these works.

I am pleased to inform Deputy Reilly that alternative accommodation has been sourced for the entire school population pending the completion of the works. This accommodation is in Rush-Lusk Educate Together national school. The Department provided an off-site construction building for this school earlier this year and accommodation is available in it on a short term basis. Transport to this accommodation is in the process of being arranged for the Hedgestown pupils. They are expected to take up occupation when the schools re-open after the mid-term break.

The Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, wants to take the opportunity to thank the authorities and the principal's of both Hedgestown national school and Rush-Lusk Educate Together for their co-operation in what is a difficult time for Hedgestown national school, in particular.

With regard to the proposed large scale capital project for Hedgestown, the Department intends providing the school with a new eight classroom generic repeat design building. A site for this development is being provided by the parish. It has been technically assessed and deemed suitable. The project for the new building was announced by the former Minister, Deputy Mary Hanafin, to progress to architectural planning in April 2007.

In common with all applications for large scale capital funding, the application for Hedgestown was assessed in accordance with the Department's published prioritisation criteria for large scale building projects. It has been assigned a band two rating under this process.

Deputy James Reilly

That is a shame.

Deputy Conor Lenihan

Due to the extent of the demand on the Department's capital programme, the Minister is not in a position to indicate a timeframe as to when the project will be approved to proceed but a band two rating is the second highest band rating possible and this means that the project is well positioned to advance once the requisite funding is available.

The Minister wants to assure the Deputy that the Department is fully committed to ensuring that the current difficulties at Hedgestown national school are addressed as expeditiously as possible. The Department will also continue to consider the advancement of the large scale large scale building project for the school under the school modernisation and building programme.

Once again I thank Deputy Reilly for providing me with the opportunity to address the House on this matter and to outline the current position.

The Dáil adjourned at 5.25 p.m. until 2.30 p.m. on Wednesday, 29 October 2008.

Dáil Éireann díospóireacht - Thursday, 23 Oct 2008