Debate contribution: Waiting Lists: Action Plan

Debate contribution by Ms Sorcha Eastwood on 20 February 2024.

MLA

Ms Sorcha Eastwood

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

20 February 2024

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Waiting Lists: Action Plan

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4380737

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I want to take the opportunity to speak on behalf of my constituents who are impacted by cancer, which impacts on everybody across Northern Ireland. At the minute, we deal constantly with emails from people who are on red-flag referral waiting lists, particularly for breast cancer, and are living in utter anxiety. Many families know what it is like to get that call, letter or email — whatever the form of communication — to say, "We think you may have cancer". Let me tell you this: those are the longest hours and minutes that you will deal with in your life. We have condemned people across the North to waiting unnecessarily by smashing through the targets that we set for them. We need to get really serious about the fact that that causes people hurt and harm. It would be remiss of me not to speak on behalf of those people today. The other thing that is crucial in addressing the crisis for all waiting lists — not just elective but every unction that we have — is the workforce. I sit on the Committee for the Economy, and I have raised that at every turn in the road, saying that the Health Department cannot do this alone; it needs support from across the aboard. When it comes to the Department for the Economy, the wee bit of a difference that I can make is asking, "What are we doing to make sure that we have enough training places in our universities? What are we doing to make sure that health and social care workers are valued, that they have career progression and career pathways and that we, as a society, value that work and consider it important?" Let us be honest: in the past, far too many people have been content to sit back and regard that work as requiring low or no skills, unimportant and worthy of little pay. Yet those are the people who pick our families up off the floor when they are at their most vulnerable. Those are the people who go into our families' homes at 2.00 and 3.00 in the morning to help with PICC lines or drivers, and those are the people whom we are not respecting and giving those pathways and that prestige to. As I said, we will not counter this problem through one Ministry, but I know that Alliance will not be found wanting when it comes to supporting and working with the Health Minister, and we will do so with an open hand and an open heart. We talk about transformation, and I get that it is not easy. However, when you have a loved one sitting in hospital facilities for three and four months at a time in accommodation that, if it were anywhere else, would not be fitting, you understand that that is why we need to transform. We need to do that so that my family member does not have to go through what your family member went through. It is easy to say, "We want everything", but the only way that we will get that is by being realistic and honest and doing things in a structured and strategic way that means that everyone can get what they want. However, we need to do it together; it cannot be just one Department in isolation. The Minister will have my support and that of my colleagues. I thank the Principal Deputy Speaker for giving me time in the grace period to make my points.

589 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 09:40 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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