McDonnell’s ‘muzzling’ attempt to make HSE forum a ‘laughing stock’

Bradley Bytes – A sort of political column with Dara Bradley 

The dangers of self-censorship became a flashpoint at the latest HSE West Regional Health Forum meeting.
The monthly meeting offers Councillors from across the West, including Galway’s two local authorities, the only opportunity to hold managers in the health system to account in a public forum.
Because media is there, it is open and transparent. Members are permitted to submit four written questions in advance about policy or issues with hospitals or services.
They get a written reply at the meeting, and have the opportunity to further tease out the answer with a follow-up oral question. The written replies are usually very civil-servicey, but the oral response from the head-honchos in Saolta University Health Care Group, the HSE, and senior hospital staff, can be illuminating.
Often questions are ‘negative’ or highlight shortcomings in the health system but that’s the nature of things – there’s no point asking questions about perfectly functioning elements of healthcare. And they’re often posed by politicians whose sole intention is that the service is improved on the back of them highlighting it.
It’s not just politicians lashing the HSE, although sometimes that happens. It is also an opportunity for managers to explain complex problems. Questions at the HSE forum are a vital component of a functioning health service.
That’s why City Councillor Declan McDonnell’s suggestion that members should only be allowed to ask three questions, instead of four, was greeted with contempt by his colleagues.
Declan moaned that the forum had spent an hour and a half responding to questions. Ah, diddums.
Four questions each was “too many”, he said. “It’s not what the health forum is about . . . it should be about policy,” he added.
To which several councillors responded that questioning the unelected health executive is exactly what the forum is about.
Roscommon Cllr Tony Ward was having none of it – his area is far too big to be reducing the scope to question officials. He said four was the maximum questions they could ask, but it’s not a target, and there was no obligation on members to ask any questions at all.
Mayo Cllr Michael Kilcoyne railed against Declan’s ‘charter for self-censorship’.
“We’d be the laughing stock of the region if we did that,” he said. “There’s no point muzzling ourselves. They (health officials) would be delighted with it because they don’t want us asking questions. We should be asking more questions. This is the only forum where we can hold them to account,” he said.
Tony Canavan, the new Chief Executive of Saolta, who is quite adept at answering questions and is fair and honest in his responses, welcomed the suggestion. “We’d be very happy to accommodate it,” he said, with a straight face . . . which is exactly why Declan’s suggestion should be rejected outright.

For more Bradley Bytes, see this week’s Galway City Tribune