Open correspondence to Jim Daly TD – 2/2/2012

Preamble:

Frank,

I note your comments re my position in relation to follow up from the meeting on November 21st. I advised the committee I would be happy to answer any questions that were forwaded to me. I have not received any further correspondence from the committee since that meeting.

Kind regards
Jim

–
Jim Daly TD
Constituency Office
Clonakilty
Co. Cork

WCSOS Response:

Having consulted with my colleagues on the committee who attended on the night, it is our recollection that you were to come back to us with answers to the questions which we asked at the meeting and you were seen to take note of several or appeared to do so. We agree that we said and you agreed to respond to any further questions we sent in the following three weeks. We also agree that nobody sent you any further questions because we felt that we had asked sufficient at the meeting.

At the present time, the committee feel that you have made no effort whatsoever to further the case being made by WCSOS to prevent an inevitable loss of lives in West Cork and in Skibbereen in particular, which the implementation of the proposed removal of the Patient carrying ambulance from the area for twelve hours a day, seven days a week will surely cause. I hope we are wrong and that it will never happen, but after working on this for seven months now we are more convinced than ever of the consequences.

The series of three meetings on the 12th December between HSE / NAS and various concerned groups including WCSOS, the GPs, and community First responders and the Castletownbere group did nothing to quell our fears, and if anything the complete ignorance of Robert Morton of the geographical diversity of West Cork, and his outright rejection of the value of local knowledge of the ambulance personnel, raised further fears for the people of the area given the proposal to centralise the ambulance call out service to Tallaght, and his glib assurances that a new Paramedic from Latvia would have no difficulty in finding a patient anywhere in West Cork did nothing to ease these fears.

You will be well aware of the situation in West Cork where there are very many families with the same forename and surname in practically every Townland and street, and the difficulties encountered by even those with intimate local knowledge to find them in a safe time frame. Also that there are many identical Townland and place names to make the job more difficult.

We are also particularly disappointed that you gave us no indication of the fact that Minister Reilly is in Bantry on Friday evening at the hospital, and later at the Westlodge, but could find no time in the last seventeen weeks to even answer our request to receive a delegation from Skibbereen Town Council / WCSOS until last week when his Secretary emailed to say he was too busy. You also appear not to be able or willing to request the Minister to meet us.

There is still time Jim. We intend to have a quiet and dignified presence at Bantry Hospital on Friday night and I have asked the Minister again for just a few minutes of his time to meet a delegation. If you are in any way sincere about supporting the people of West Cork in this matter, you will lend your support to our request and try to get us a positive answer from the Minister before Friday evening.

Kind regards,
Frank Fahy
Mayor, Skibbereen Town Council
Chairman, WestCorkSOS.com

(Correspondence by email)