In response to the latest crisis engulfing our healthcare system, MLAs on the health committee were forced to cut short their Christmas break to attend an emergency meeting. Yesterday’s urgent sitting attended by the minister, Mike Nesbitt, and senior health officials provided cold comfort to anyone hoping for immediate interventions, rapid responses, radical action or indeed any sign of momentum.
Whilst the minister acknowledged that things were bad here, he stressed that this was not a “Northern Ireland specific problem”. This, he noted, was not to minimise the seriousness of the situation, but to demonstrate that this was a UK-wide issue.
At the outset of the meeting, he asked the chair, Liz Kimmins, what role the committee wanted to play. Did they want to be positive and constructive? Without waiting for a response, he took a swipe at MLAs who “engage only after the fact” and are happy to criticise without producing alternatives.
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The health committee is an oversight committee. It is their role to scrutinise the policy, administration and the spending of the Department of Health. It is a cross-party committee acting on behalf of the Executive and the public. They can of course be supportive. But their key function is to ensure accountability and transparency. They should be casting light on how we managed to be in an entirely predictable mess with a system that is out of control,
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Mr Nesbitt reiterated that he was offering a “blank page” for next winter. What does this mean? A blank page, in what way? It’s a fairly safe bet the same problems will need to be addressed, this time next year.
Reflecting on his recent visit to an Emergency Department in Derry, he highlighted the lack of dignity and privacy afforded to a man who had been waiting on a chair for four days. This is by any measure a shocking state of affairs. What precisely was the minister going to do about this? Well in a word, nothing. He was “looking for short-term levers” at his disposal to address but ultimately couldn’t come up with any that could address the systemic issues.
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Noting the widespread dismay and alarm at the diabolical state of services, Diane Dodds suggested that people at home watching the committee would be “disappointed”. Essentially, we are being told that we must “chug along” and expect nothing better. The minister begged to differ with her assessment. He was not sure how disappointed people are as they understand very well that MLAs voted for an entirely inadequate health budget. Trust me, minister - “disappointed” doesn’t even begin to describe it.
Overall, it was a completely depressing, dispiriting affair. No new ideas, no detailed plans, no initiatives to address sub-optimal use of resources, disillusion, poor productivity and underperformance.
Our system is broken, and more money is not the answer, no matter how many times our politicians tell us otherwise.
