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MINISTER FOR HEALTH James Reilly has today said that he was “quite happy” to pursue the HSE inquiry into the death of Savita Halappanavar, stating that it has already commenced.
His comment came in response to the continued calls of Praveen Halappanavar, via his legal team, that the investigation into his wife’s death should be a public one and that he would not cooperate with any HSE inquiry.
Making reference to this (audio below), Reilly said:
There may come a point where, obviously, we won’t have the completeness of information without Mr Halappanavar’s input and to me that will be regrettable but I want to get the investigation to that point at least before we have any further public discourse on this.
Earlier today, An Taoiseach Enda Kenny appealed to Praveen Halappanavar to meet with the chairman of the inquiry, Sir Sabaratnam Arulkumaran:
I would appeal directly to Praveen Halappanavar, who is a decent man, to meet with the chairperson of investigation team without prejudice because it is very necessary that the truth of these circumstances be found out.
Audio courtesy of NewsTalk.
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This ministers ineptitude knows no bounds.
Whatever bounds O’Reilly and Kenny do know, they have set their target of exceeding those bounds every day they are in office. The two of them should resign and allow people who genuinely care about our citizens run the country and its health service.
Of course Reilly would agree/favour an HSE investigation.
They are all part of the crony circle.
Part of Irish nepotism.
It is crucial that this inquiry is conducted openly and by expert witnesses not connected to Ireland.
This country has a scandalous record as far as inquiries are concerned.
I very much hope that this blunder ends up before the European Court for Human Rights.
A public fiasco of the highest order. Carry out a medical enquiry, and let the man grieve for his wife.
Just let the poor man grieve his wife.
Seriously,this government are an embarrassment to the country.
(cue the blueshirt red thumbs)
It is not just that . Praveen is changing the goalposts. First he objects to the GUH members of the investigation team. When that is granted he changes tack . He is obviously grief stricken but he cannot keep changing his mind.
Let the enquiry commence and let be sen to react to this awful chain of events.
At the same time the pro-life lobby are giving out about the alleged pro-abortion attitude of the head of the enquiry.
How else to proceed in the face of such acrimony and divergent opinions?
Let it start and then we can ,at least, begin to get reasoned opinions.
Praveen should be careful of what he wants. Grief is terrible , but there is a need for rational thought. A public enquiry would take years. Let this one go ahead speedily, and then take stock.
unfortunately it is not that simple, since the husband is refusing to speak to the she inquiry team.instead he wants a full public enquiry which could take months or a year after it is set up.
@ Rory, Interesting points!
@Rory, interesting points!
@Rory Conway: Praveen H has said right from the beginning that he doesn’t want the HSE involved in the enquiry. The government said they would respect his wishes. They then turned round and let the HSE set up the enquiry! Says volumes.
Someone said in the Dail tonight that they need to press the reset button on the enquiry.
We could do with a rest button for the government as well, only there’s no-one to put in their place.
Rory you keep posting that claim about changing goal posts in various threads but never respond when others point out that the husband has being calling for a public inquiry since this tragic story became public knowledge.
This O Reilly is a complete disaster. In fact Kenny is not much better. His comments in the Dail today on this issue were nothing short of scandalous. The family of Savita should have been treated in a much more sensitive manner.
I wanted to comment but I just can’t find the words in the thesaurus for this level of incompetence, arrogance and ignorance, so I’ll shut up… Oh let’s not forget to legislate too…
Bully boy tactics.
Dayzee
I see you changed your name. Welcome back. Whats this about nepotism in the Investigation Team into the death if this unfortunate lady. Who is related to the Minister and the Taoiseach on the Committee as you suggest?
I would not trust the HSE to investigate if my dog or cat died thank god this has gone world wide show up how this twisted system is here in Ireland
Not a bit surprised, the arrogance of this man knows no bounds. Why care what the husband has to say? After all it is probably better for O’Reilly and the HSE if he has no input into the case! Such a disgrace
My comment isn’t clear, apologies, I mean that O’Reilly and the HSE are probably happy the man isn’t cooperating as it suits them better. I think it is terribly that they are denying the man what he is requesting
Organising a pee up in a brewery comes to mind – a sad farce!
The spotlight on this government continues to shine more brightly with each passing day and they don’t like it. The ineptitude and ignorance is only astounding and as for the HSE led enquiry? Little more than an administrative white wash by those who honed their skills under Harney. Time to finally legislate and ignore the likes of Ronan Mullen, the Church and those God bothering individuals. Maybe its also time for we citizens to get off our arses and vote with feet and voices on this scandal.
And we can probably also ignore the fact that a world leading expert, who has no links to anybody on the panel was chosen to head this investigation. But of course that means nothing at all. No doubt he’s in cahoots with everybody as well.
Jim…the enquiry proposed is under the aegis of the HSE so independence is highly questionable if not downright suspect despite the qualifications of some…personally I intend to get off my backside and lobby for our archaic law to be changed and the first step is a full, independent enquiry within a certain time frame.
She died on the 28/10/2012 why did it take 16 days for this to be made public ?
The one thing this shower of incompatent oafs are good at.
Media manipulation.
I feel the reason they did not make it public that she died on the 28/10/2012 was the children Referendum Was more important pushing the yes vote shame on the government SHAME ON YOU
Ye complained about Harney?
Reilly said as did Kenny and Gilmore that they would sort everything??
Silly Silly Voters!!
No alternative to step into the breach – we are effed – would be great if someone competent could come in and do the job – Michael Martin Mary Harvey et al have done so much damage that I almost think we cannot fix this
Here is an absolutely crazy idea ….
How about we take the Northern Ireland health service model and apply it in the South.
We negotiate with the existing Northern Health service management team, pay them handsomely for their inputs and extra responsibility and ask them to incorporate our Health service into theirs. We already spend twice as much per capita on our health service and get a tenth of the service.
Ask them to manage ours under their existing management structure.
Then, we immediately disband our own HSE, re-hire only those that are capable of making a positive contribution, and let the rest of the waste go off and try and find jobs in the private sector for a quarter of the wages.
EVEYONE wins. Just an idea… I would love to hear the arguments against the proposal.
Tick tock tick tock…the further this is badly handled, the further this is made a b***x off, the further it takes to legislate is harming these gombeens further and further. Times coming to and end if they keep going like this.
If it was an Irish woman who died in this tragic way it would not be getting so much attention, Sad but true. I’m ashamed to be Irish. If you agree with me, press the Dislike button.
That is very clever! That’s why I pressed the like button.
Normally when Reilly says “black”, I assume an albino polar bear that has never seen sunlight and has just seen a ghost.
But in this case, for probably the first (and last) time ever, I tend to agree with him that a public inquiry is not the best approach. My reasons are probably very different to his, but there ya have it!
The proposed HSE inquiry would be a medical inquiry, headed by the president of the International Federation of Obstetrics and Gynaecology. Who knows what its findings would be, but it sounds to me like it has all the necessary expertise to draw meaningful conclusions.
If any criminal negligence were found, a prosecution could follow such an inquiry.
A public inquiry on the other hand would be headed by a judge, whose area of expertise is (of course!) legal. Its findings would be legally sound but toothless, and probably very far in the future.
If any criminal negligence were to be found, it seems from previous public inquiries that testimony given to that inquiry prevents any prosecution from taking place. I don’t agree with that, but it’s been the case with previous public inquiries…
Completely agree with you despite my detestation of o Reilly. A legal inquiry will only serve the solicitors we need a medically competent inquiry for the public interest.
The general views being aired by all parties to this debate is that is no criminal negligence here. An enquiry could take years to undertake. No reason why the HSE can’t run the enquiry but I do agree that that there should not be reps from the hospital board on the enquiry board – they should be summoned as witnesses.
I’m just wondering why HIQA isn’t conducting this inquiry??
Wasn’t the whole purpose of HIQA to gave an independent agency to keep an eye on the HSE and other aspects of the health service??
did he escape st claberts again!
Na hÉireann a múscail.
Not much point in being awake until you take your head out of your arse!
Every human being no matter race or culture deserve the best treatment see here on this island of Ireland for many decades Irish people suffered at the hands of governments and there eyes and ears were closed and thousands suffered now we are in the EU sorry NO more cover Ups they never listened to well HELLO NOW IT STOPS but the sad thing is this woman had to die well YOU WILL ALL BE SEEN FOR WHAT yOU ARE MONEY IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN LIFE
The premiere of our country appealing to a man whose wife he believes died due to the incompetence of the HSE to appear as a witness in front of an HSE inquiry. Such utter crap. The man is distraught and wants an idependent inquiry. I think I would want an independent one also. That shower will only be interested in covering their arses at all costs. A shambles of the highest order.
Of course he’s happy ! It’s his fellow clinicians on the team.
There are people who will vote like turkeys voting for Christmas. The last two referendums were a horrific spin and lies. The only hope is to lose party system. Direct democracy all we are changing are the officers on the door.
The HSE always conduct the investigations in these cases. Unfortunately, these are not infrequent, as due to the nature of medicine, people die in hospital, and if there are any questions about how their case was managed, this warrants an inquiry. In addition to the statutory inquest.
I can certainly see the ministers point here, although I am not usually a fan. Having a full public enquiry would be lengthy, expensive and would set the precedent that a public enquiry would have to be held whenever there is a question mark over the management of a case with an adverse outcome.
The people conduction the enquiry are well respected in their fields and have the appropriate medical credentials to understand the issues at stake.
I hope this comes to a speedy conclusion, to give her family the answers they need.
*conducting* damn iPhone
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