DISSENT OVER MATERNITY HOSPITAL IS BEING SHUT DOWN, SAYS GREEN TD
A REBELLION is growing on the back benches of the Green Party over the Government’s decision to sign off on the National Maternity Hospital.
Dublin Central TD Neasa Hourigan vowed to vote against the Government and with Sinn Féin, stating she ‘wants it on the record for 299 years that I think this is a bad deal’.
It comes as Cabinet yesterday signed off on the ownership structure for the co-location of the new National Maternity Hospital (NMH) after a ‘two-week pause’.
The plan will see the NMH co-locate at St Vincent’s Elm Park campus under a 299-year lease.
Following concerns from within Government and Opposition parties, three additional elements were added to the memo brought by Health Minister Stephen Donnelly.
A report will be published annually for the first five years of operation of the hospital, recording details on services provided.
Secondly, the clinical director for the National Women and Infants Programme has been tasked with scoping out a proposal for a new Centre of Excellence for Women’s Healthcare.
The final part of the new memo saw a sentence added about the controversial term ‘clinically appropriate’.
Mr Donnelly said: ‘Cabinet agreed that the term “clinically appropriate” allows all legally permissible services in maternity, gynaecology, obstetrics, neonatology and gender recognition.’ However, the additions did little to quell the fears of Ms Hourigan who said yesterday she would vote with a Sinn Féin motion calling for the NMH to be built on publicly owned land. However, the Government later confirmed they would not oppose the motion.
This led many to assume there would be no vote on the motion.
However, a vote was ultimately called by the Rural Independents and will take place tonight.
Ms Hourigan said: ‘I’m absolutely prepared to vote against the Government on this because if this is a 299-year deal, I want it on the record for 299 years that I think it is a bad idea. I don’t feel it is respectful to deny myself or my constituents the right to have their objection on the record in the form of that motion.’
She argued that the Government ‘obviously do not agree with the motion’ and therefore should
‘I want it on record I think it is a bad idea’ ‘It is a big leap of faith’
oppose it. Ms Hourigan added: ‘I’m sure they are worried about [Government TDs voting against them] but that doesn’t absolve them of their democratic duty to allow people to vote.’
Green TD Patrick Costello also stating that the Cabinet decision was ‘the wrong one’.
He said: ‘The failure to remove the phrase “clinically appropriate” is an affront to the women who will now have to place their trust in institutions with a long track record of failing them and indeed harming them.’
Mr Costello did not state whether or not he would vote in line with the Government.
Fine Gael Senator Regina Doherty told the Irish Daily Mail the Government is taking a ‘big leap of faith’. She said: ‘Some people believe it will be grand. An awful lot don’t feel that way. I think there are a lot in the middle. I’m probably one of them. ‘It is a big leap of faith because of generations of mistrust and distrust and I think the proof will be in the pudding.’ The Irish Daily Mail understands that the fears of Tourism Minister Catherine Martin were also allayed in recent days. The Green Party deputy leader is understood to have expressed a view at Cabinet that there was legal robust support from the Attorney General of the project. Minister Donnelly said that the decision to pause Cabinet approval of the NMH was ‘useful’ and had started a ‘genuine conversation nationally’.