I thank the Deputy. As I said clearly, responsibility for delivering this hospital is with the contractor. The State - the Deputy and me, and the people we represent - is paying the contractor to complete the contract on time. It would be very helpful for everybody to be aware that we together are paying a contractor that is not delivering its commitments on time for this State and for all the people in this State. It is essential that it does. I am holding the contractor seriously to account for the dates that it …

As the Deputy is aware, this year's capital plan includes an upgrade and extension to the oncology day ward at University Hospital Kerry, with a vertical extension over the existing palliative care ward. The scope includes 14 day treatment cubicles, two treatment isolation rooms and seven outpatient consultation rooms. That is really important. In addition to that, we are shifting the way in which financing is determined this year to try to achieve better regional equity of access and better equity across the regio…

I appreciate that the Deputy is raising that, but this is really important in terms of achieving equity of access across the board. It will matter for the people in Kerry.

Like others, I want to first acknowledge the parents of Harvey Morrison Sherratt and all of the parents who were in the audiovisual room yesterday. I thank them for working with me and for engaging with me and indeed all of the advocates who are bringing to me the issues of today and yesterday. We will work together to devise the correct structure to enable a proper inquiry into the work that has happened and not happened in the CHI orthopaedic section. One of the most important comments I heard yesterday is that p…

Deputy Murphy clearly does not understand it.

Today marks the first of the Government's five health budgets. With it comes a clear commitment to invest in a health service that meets people where they are and when they need it. Our priorities for 2026 are clear: regional equity and access; reduced waiting times through productivity and increased capacity; and safe, high-quality care. The health budget will grow this year by €1.5 billion, reaching €27.4 billion. That includes €25.8 billion in current expenditure and over €1.56 billion in capital investment. We …

Excuse me.

I actually gave the figures for drugs just there. The Deputy obviously did not hear what I said.

I thank the Deputy. He is correct. On Monday, the Tánaiste and I met with the parents of Harvey Morrison Sherratt, along with other advocates who were there to support the family. The Tánaiste and I listened carefully to what his parents said. It must have been a particularly difficult time, as all of this period has been for them, but also recognising it has been two months since the death of their little boy. At the meeting, it was agreed that we would work in partnership on the structure of an inquiry into spina…

Yes, it would be my intention, irrespective of the form of investigation or inquiry, that it would be comprehensive in the way the Deputy has outlined, that it would be transparent and that it would be an inquiry that is also capable of making recommendations, as the parents and advocates have looked for. As he will be aware, in some forms of inquiry where information is presented during the inquiry, it can never be used in other proceedings. I am very conscious, for example, of a comparable model in relation to Li…

Again, I agree with the Deputy. On the Dickson report I will provide a note to Deputies on this. There is a follow-up process with those families. I do not have the details to hand but I would like to provide that information to them. Deputy Cullinane is absolutely right about developing services now. An inquiry should not prohibit or preclude that. He will be aware that I have strengthened very considerably the board of CHI with appointments most recently, and in particular with Fergus Finlay who is a very strong …

The Government is of course, as is everybody else, committed to improving cancer care, ensuring better prevention, maintaining improvements in cancer survival rates, and timely access to treatments. The national cancer control programme, NCCP, has a number of metrics for breast cancer services. They are consistently reviewed to guide service advancements and to make improvements. Since 2017 the total number of patients annually receiving this type of surgery increased by 10% to well over 1,500 in 2023. Over this pe…

The five-year net survival rates for breast cancer grew from 71% in the 1990s to 87.5% for the 2019 to 2022 period. We are going in the right direction. The Deputy is absolutely right to highlight it. We have had more people through the system and demand is increasing year on year. More than 56,000 patients were seen in clinics in 2024, up from 50,000 in 2019. From my analysis, the single biggest issue, although there are many, is the timely access to MRI as a diagnostic tool. From the data I have, the reason for b…

I would be very grateful for the specifics of what the Deputy is asserting. I will check that out. It is very much the opposite to what we are trying to do. Considering the number of vacancies we are desperately trying to fill, I would be very concerned about that. I would appreciate if the Deputy could help me out with more information on that. Several cancer centres have plans for additional theatre and inpatient capacity specifically for cancer and inpatient care because the theatre access is so important. Part …

I thank the Deputy. As he is aware, the programme for Government will set out a review of the national development plan as a key priority. Through the NDP review, we are prioritising critical economic growth but also the health infrastructure we need to have, which the Deputy has articulated. The substantially enhanced NDP provision for the health sector of €9.25 billion will support the delivery of equitable, accessible and high-quality healthcare across Ireland. We have seen a number of examples of that happening…

The question is around what is capable of being delivered to absolute completion within the next five years and how we balance and manage that. I do not think it is a question of right or wrong. Both the Deputy and I want to see the infrastructure delivered immediately if possible but we both live in the real world where we have to go through planning and procurement processes. There is a slowness in doing that, unfortunately - in the Government and the public sector doing that - which does not challenge the privat…

There is no barrier to them in the context of the funding side of it. The bigger issue is the planning side but we will work through it together. I had the good fortune to be in Waterford, a really excellently run hospital. I was in the cath labs and got to see the different theatre configuration, which, of course, has been delivered. It is the case that the cardiologists have been recruited and that was confirmed to me by the hospital management and the IHA management so we will see that commitment delivered. The …

There was a recruitment process, and there you go. I stood, as I am sure the Deputy has done, and his party colleagues were there with me, outside the pretty magnificent surgical hub that is being completed there. We would very much like to see that. If anybody is going to run that well, I am confident that Waterford will do it. Those projects are being delivered and I look forward to seeing the physical transformation of that hospital as much as every other hospital with the ongoing capital investment that has hap…

I thank the Deputy. The Government is obviously committed to improving cancer care generally. As the Deputy is aware, a total of €105 million has been invested in the strategy since 2017, including €23 million in budget 2025. Under the national plan for radiation oncology, state-of-the-art radiation oncology centres have opened in Cork and Galway in 2019 and 2023, respectively, which was €120 million capital investment. In Dublin, the St. Luke's Radiation Oncology Network, which includes St. James's and Beaumont Ho…

There are five public radiotherapy treatment centres with a total of 22 linear accelerators across the services. Galway has four, Cork has five and St. Luke's has 14 machines across the three sites in Dublin. The HSE also contracts radiation oncology services for public patients to centres in Waterford and Limerick and has a service-level agreement with the North West Cancer Centre in Altnagelvin to provide radiotherapy services for patients within a 90-minute road journey of Derry. Under the National Plan for Radi…