STRAWMEN MUST NOT SWAY HOSPITAL DEBATE

PETER BOYLAN at least had the gumption to say it. He told the Oireachtas Health Committee that it was time we ‘stood up for ourselves as a people, face down the Church and say we need that land’.

The topic was the new National Maternity Hospital, and Dr Boylan’s sentiments are much more widely shared than has been acknowledged in this saga.

But this is the ultimate strawman argument. Anxiety about Church influence is overstated, and while Dr Boylan speaks of having researched the topic exhaustively, a large number of his peers believe the deal struck is legally sound and entirely positive. Their position is supported by the Government’s legal advice too.

The spectre of ill-tempered nuns ready to swoop in and drag Irish maternity care back to the 1950s is simply not convincing. The weight of expert enthusiasm for the hospital should be decisive.