Debate contribution: Primary Care: Extreme Pressures

Debate contribution by Mr Justin McNulty on 14 May 2024.

MLA

Mr Justin McNulty

Party at the time

Social Democratic and Labour Party

Date

14 May 2024

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Primary Care: Extreme Pressures

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4490313

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I support the motion, as well as the amendment from my party, the SDLP. I welcome the opportunity to speak to the motion today. I regularly visit Daisy Hill Hospital to speak with staff and patients in the hospital corridors. I also visit Craigavon Area Hospital, and there the outworkings of the crisis in primary care can be seen plainly at first hand. Far too many people present at accident and emergency departments because they cannot get appointments with their GP, because their GP appointments are delayed, as a consequence of which there are health impacts, or because they have just given up and do not go to see their GP. The health impacts are then exacerbated. Far too many people are lined up head to toe on trolleys and chairs in hospital corridors, waiting for prescriptions to be dispensed. They are often waiting to receive what is essentially primary care because they cannot get an appointment with their GP. I do not for a second blame general practitioners for the crisis in primary care: far from it. GPs and their staff are doing what they can with the resources available to them. Unfortunately, they suffer from poor management and a lack of ambition from the health establishment. Take, for example, the long overdue health hub in my constituency. The development of the hub in Newry was announced in 2013. It was recommended for fast-tracking and was expected to be operational by 2016. Eight years on from that expected opening date, not a single sod has been turned on the site. I have lobbied extensively on the issue, and although there are always unforeseen project issues, I neither understand nor accept that it is reasonable for people in my constituency to wait any longer for a health hub that was promised over 10 years ago. Is it any wonder that the people of Newry, south Armagh and south Down believe that they are always the last to get and the first to lose? I welcome the opportunity to speak to the motion today, but we need to get the basics right. Access to health services is a critical issue for the people whom I represent, and they have a right to expect that promises made will be promises kept. For the Mullaghbawn GP surgery in south Armagh, I particularly welcome the component of the motion that calls for the extension of GP indemnity insurance to the North, in line with arrangements in Britain. The heart of the motion is correct, in that it identifies and seeks to remove the burdens and barriers faced by primary care practitioners. My family's local GP surgery in Mullaghbawn has experienced tremendous difficulty recruiting a managing GP after the departure of the long-standing local doctors in the practice. Dr Deane and Dr Maguire left a lasting legacy of care and compassion for their patients, and they are missed by all, as is their predecessor, Dr Smyth. In my efforts to secure a replacement GP in Mullaghbawn, I advocated special incentives to entice an appropriate managing GP to the surgery, but those calls largely fell on deaf ears, with the health authorities seemingly preferring to stick to established policy rather than act innovatively. If we are serious about confronting the challenges in primary care, it is imperative that we recognise that doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result is the essence of insanity. I add my voice to the calls on the Minister of Health to provide an ambitious vision for growing the primary care workforce. I will finish by paying tribute to the staff and clinicians in GP surgeries who are overwhelmed by the demand. I know from my own doctors in Newry, Dr McVerry, Dr McGee and Dr Farnon in the Cornmarket surgery. When I visit, the phones are ringing incessantly, machine gun-style. I wonder how on earth they cope with the relentless, incessant pressure. I thank those clinicians and their staff: well done, and keep going.

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

Assessment

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Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 10:23 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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