Jennifer Carroll MacNeill

That is so wrong of the Deputy.

I thank the Deputies for the work they are doing with and on behalf of women. It is wonderful to see so many different parties and so many different voices, male and female, articulate the female health experience. Every single person knows that it has been overlooked. Every single person knows that experience of telling a story and not being listened to or believed. I completely respect those exp…

As I said, I am not here to politicise anything. I do not critique the Deputy-----

Would the Deputy like-----

I will address the women in the House.

What is important for us is actually making progress on endometriosis and there is some progress taking place. The first major difference we have, and this does not account for the many years of underinvestment in and under-recognition of women's health, is that we have a dedicated women and infants health programme. That has made some difference to how maternity services are conceived. We have mo…

-----to reduce the amount of travel and make sure there is an opportunity to get more regional care. In the countermotion we try to set out what has happened, what has yet to happen and to recognise that there are different choices. The point was raised about private treatment and choices. Women are entitled to choose. I want them to be treated within the public system.

I want women to be treated within the public system. I want to make sure that women have every option to be treated in the public system.

However, where a woman has gone abroad, she must be supported when she comes back to Ireland. We have set that out in the countermotion.

That is an outrageous statement to make in the House. That is a term used in domestic abuse situations.

It is by a woman.

I am trying to deal with this issue. Forgive me.

Am I entitled to speak for one minute, a Cheann Comhairle?

I move amendment No. 1: To delete all words after "Dáil Eireann" and substitute the following: "recognises that: — endometriosis is one of the most common gynaecological conditions in Ireland and approximately one in ten women may have endometriosis; — there is a wide range of symptoms associated with this condition and the burden of disease varies from person to person; — some women may have…

However, I cannot allow clinical decisions to be on the record of the Dáil.

I do not wish to speak across the Minister of State, Deputy Troy, whose voice is just as important as anybody else's in the House. I appreciate the Ceann Comhairle's discretion.

I did not say that.

I will take this on the basis of it being a health matter. The HSE and the NCCP have recently been working with community organisations to distribute the 2025 funding of €5.5 million. The first call for the full members of the Alliance of Community Cancer Support Centres, of which Purple House is one, is now almost complete and the second call for the associate members is now under way. I think so…

I thank the Deputy for her question. This concern is specific to Portiuncula, which demonstrated a much higher than expected rate of requirement for Caesarean sections and cooling of the baby. This was a specific issue. All of the recommendations of the Walker report were implemented. There has been a 100% increase in the number of obstetric consultants and a 25% increase in the number of midwives…

Every single one of them.

I thank Deputy Healy-Rae for his comments on abolishing the means test for carers. We are systematically trying to get to the point where it has been abolished. I recognise the changes that have been made because what we want to see, as the Deputy said, is people staying in their own homes for as long as possible for their dignity, comfort and connection with their families and because that is the…

It was very important to conduct the national assessment of insourcing, which I commissioned at the beginning of April because of my concerns, and to publish it. The Deputy has had an opportunity to consider it today. We have to use every lever to implement Sláintecare, including rostering for five over seven days, the public only consultant contract and making the best case possible for as much i…

This is an issue for enterprise, social protection and health. GPs are private practitioners. Many of them have contracts with the HSE to provide public services. Services provided outside of these are a private matter. The Medical Council is there to protect the public. Part of this is registering doctors as quickly as may be, and part of it is making sure that doctors operate to a very high stan…

I will repeat some of the things that have been said about recruitment. The numbers are up by 25% over that period. The pay and numbers strategy resulted in a net increase of 2,000 people into the health system, with 2,000 people who had temporary contracts made permanent, 2,000 vacancies and a net uplift of 2,000 people. I will be happy to provide the detail to the Deputy. Nevertheless, we conti…

The Government remains committed to increasing capacity in the public system. The commitment is underpinned by unparalleled levels of investment as we move to universal access to health care. However, until the capacity is in place to meet the increased levels of demand, it is necessary in the interim to make use of all available capacity in the public and private systems to ensure that patients h…