Tipperary TD furious over Nenagh nursing home plans – ‘We won’t get screwed a second time’

Labour Deputy Alan Kelly has called on the Government not to take Nenagh’s new state-of-the-art 50-bed Community Nursing Home as a step down sub-acute facility. Separately, Independent Cllr Seamus Morris has called for an inquiry into who carried out the reconfiguration of hospitals in the Mid-West.

In a passionate speech to the Dáil, Deputy Kelly addressed Minister of State, Mary Butler, about the Nenagh Community Nursing Home.

A decision has been made by the Regional Executive Officer in HSE Mid-West to use the new building for a period of about one year as a step down sub-acute facility which will be run by a private provider with expertise in such services.

“I want the Minister of State to listen because I doubt I could be any more passionate about a particular matter,” said Deputy Kelly. “This issue is very close to my heart. I have been working on it for years. Many of my family members spent their final days in St Conlon's Community Nursing Unit in Nenagh.”

There was major upset recently about the delay relating to the new unit, he said. “This is the state-of-the-art unit on which we spent €23 million and which I campaigned to have opened. I campaigned to get the unit opened in order that the people of Nenagh and surrounding areas would have access to this 50-bed unit.

“Almost 14 years ago, HIQA stated that the building in which St Conlon's is located was not fit for purpose. There are fantastic staff and a fantastic manager, Elaine Flynn, there, but the building is not fit for purpose.

“They were excited about moving to the new unit. The residents and their families in particular were excited about moving.

According to Deputy Kelly, Bernard Gloster, chief executive of the HSE stated that three things were going to happen.

These include having medical assessment units open at St John's in Ennis and in Nenagh for 24 hours, have profiling at the point of entry to the A&E Department in UHL to discover why people had or had not gone to their GPs – “a heat-mapping measure for which I have been calling for years,” and reprofiling of the 96 beds versus the Nightingale wards to create more beds.

“I agree 100pc with all three of those measures,” Deputy Kelly told the Dáil. “We then have this bombshell about a delay of this community nursing home for 50 people that is so badly needed.

“At all clinics every Friday in Nenagh, I have people crying out for nursing home care. The Minister of State will be aware that patients in public nursing homes are often such high-dependency cases that private nursing homes will not bloody well take them. These are the people who are being let down.

“They are in hospital tonight in the mid-west and they need to get into this unit. We were told at the Health Forum that the unit would be opened this month. These people cannot get into private nursing homes because they are too high dependency. This is not acceptable.

“We got screwed in 2009 when our coronary care unit, intensive care unit and A&E department in Nenagh were taken away. “Reconfiguration was going to happen, but it never happened. We are not going to get screwed a second time.

“We are not going to allow the people of Nenagh and surrounding areas in north Tipperary to get screwed again. We are not going to allow our elderly people to be treated like this.

“The people of Nenagh will not tolerate this. The people of north Tipperary will not tolerate it. Two wrongs do not make a right.

“It is shameful that the staff, local management, the management at HSE level and HR management in the area knew nothing about this. They knew zilch. This decision was made by a very small number of people, or maybe only one person. It is wrong, and it cannot be allowed to happen.

“The unions and staff were not consulted. The Employees (Provision of Information and Consultation) Act was not adhered to. That is completely wrong because the Act has to be adhered to. Those involved met with the unions. They came back and said they were doing the same thing.

“The unions will now ballot for industrial action. Do we really want industrial action at St Conlon's home? Such action would have a knock-on effect on Nenagh Hospital, on the ambulance service and on a range of other things because SIPTU, the INMO, Fórsa and, possibly, other unions would be involved. Is this the way to start regionality?

“What will happen to the residents in St Conlon's? Will they ever see this new unit? Some of them will never see it. Will the man I am thinking about in UHL or the woman I am thinking about in Nenagh Hospital ever see it? No, they will not. Where are they going to go?

“We all know they will not accept a situation where this is not an elderly care unit. Will the Minister of State please intervene with the HSE and say, for God's sake, this is not the way to start, this is not the way regionalisation should work, this is not the way to communicate and, most of all, this is not the way to treat workers who go way above and beyond what is necessary to look after these people,” added Deputy Kelly.

Separately, Independent Tipperary County Cllr Seamus Morris said he passed a motion at a recent meeting of the HSE West Forum, calling for an independent investigation to be carried out “as to who and why the reconfiguration of acute hospital services was carried out without the necessary emergency beds or required capacity at UHL.”

“Someone decided to sign off on the reconfiguration without the necessary services being in place for safe acute hospital services for the people of the Mid West, causing untold suffering for the people of the Mid West including up to 200 premature deaths.

“In 2009 we were promised over 600 Acute Medical beds for a population of 350,000 people. We now have, in 2024, 530 AM beds for a population of 425,000. We need accountability for this disgraceful decision. One must ask why our TDs in the Midwest haven’t asked for this up to now,” said Cllr Morris.