Waiting List scandal leaves Minister Harris with no option but to resign – Mattie McGrath

Independent TD Mattie McGrath has called on the Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, to demand the immediate resignation of the Minister for Health, Simon Harris, after it emerged that the number of people on HSE waiting lists has exceeded one million people for the first time ever. Deputy McGrath was speaking after figures released this morning showed that there were 717,419 people on waiting lists in June with a further 135,000 people waiting for MRIs, ultrasounds and CT scans. This number excludes almost 3000 children who are languishing on the CAHMS waiting list as well as the 37,229 people waiting for either speech and language therapy or assessment:

“What these numbers demonstrate is that we are now in the midst of the single greatest health emergency in the history of the State; one that is being presided over by a Minister for Health who is so clearly out of his depth, it is becoming almost pitiful to watch him flounder from one crisis to another.

Minister Harris is under the very great illusion that he can simply talk his way out of these disasters.

 He cannot.

He also seems to be under the impression that the so called ‘political capital’ he has gained in some quarters for his referendum performance will be enough to see him through this.

Someone really needs to give him a wake-up call and tell him that account is empty.

By any objective measure his tenure as Minister for Health has been an unmitigated failure.

Not only do we have a million people who cannot access services under his watch; we also have a deepening of the Cervical Screening scandal with each passing day as well as the emergence of the Pandemrix controversy and the catastrophic failures associated with it that has led to who knows how many children developing narcolepsy.

In the middle of all this; what does the Minister consider a priority? To send out juvenile tweets at a Bishop who was only seeking respectful debate on a matter under his own remit.

Minister Harris has been tried, tested and found severely wanting. Its high time he had the decency to just submit his resignation and get out of the way of any actual progress that might be made in tackling these scandals,” concluded Deputy McGrath.

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