Member's statement: Emergency Care: Royal College of Emergency Medicine Report

Member's statement by Mr Danny Donnelly on 1 June 2026.

MLA

Mr Danny Donnelly

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

1 June 2026

Type

Member's statement

Business

Members' Statements

Heading

Emergency Care: Royal College of Emergency Medicine Report

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5580801

Read the official Assembly record

Text

On Thursday, in a briefing to the Health Committee, the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM) set out the scale of the crisis in emergency care in Northern Ireland and the human cost linked to the failure to address that crisis. Using the standard mortality ratio calculation, the RCEM has estimated that, in 2025 in Northern Ireland, there were 1,032 excess deaths associated with patients waiting 12 hours or more in emergency departments before admission. To put that into perspective, that amounts to around 20 people each week. In 2020, the estimated figure was 461, and, in 2016, it was 60. The royal college described the situation as catastrophic, and I wholeheartedly agree. What is especially important about the report and what Dr Michael Perry and Dr Sara-Jane McGurk reaffirmed for us at Committee is that it makes it clear that it is not simply a demand issue. Attendance numbers at emergency departments have changed little while the long waits and the mortality associated with them have risen sharply. That is exactly what happens to a system that is under sustained strain and in which patient flow is critically blocked. That is exactly what this is about: patient flow, delayed discharge, bed availability, community capacity and social care. It is a whole-system problem that requires a whole-system response. When I asked Dr Perry about the barriers facing emergency care and what the solutions were, he was clear that there was a need for a multi-year strategy that looked specifically at social care, not just the front-door solutions that inevitably add to pressures. The report looks at recommendations such as that. Dr Perry and Dr McGurk also told us that, while the Minister's Release to Rescue programme had reduced ambulance waits outside hospitals, it had made overcrowding inside worse. The royal college's recommendations are practical and deserve serious attention. They include ending the corridor care and mortality associated with long waits by the end of the decade, adopting a whole-system approach to overcrowding and ensuring that there is clear accountability for delivery. That focus on accountability is of the utmost importance. Overcrowding is persistent, 12-hour waits are now routine and corridor care continues, so clear responsibility must be taken for improvement. The Minister should set out a clear and public plan to address the concerns in the report. He should deliver a plan for real and sustainable reform. This needs to be treated as the patient safety issue that it plainly is. More than 1,000 deaths a year being associated with prolonged waits in emergency departments cannot be regarded as a routine performance problem but should be taken as a clear warning and an issue that demands urgent action. Patients and families demand better, and staff in our emergency departments, who work under extraordinary pressure, deserve better. The question is whether the Minister is prepared to respond with the seriousness and urgency that the current catastrophic situation requires.

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

Assessment

Not qualifying

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 15:42 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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