Her memory deserves better than more dither and more delay

So, now we have the Government’s response to the Savita Halappanavar scandal: more dither, more delay — resulting in the risk of more dead women.

Despite allowing the impression to take hold that it would finally make a decision at next week’s Cabinet on how to proceed in light of the 20-year-old X case ruling — no such leadership will emerge.

The Government has agreed it might make a decision, sometime, maybe next year, and that the Dáil will debate the issue — but it can’t say when.

But if they cannot be bothered to make an actual decision at next Tuesday’s Cabinet meeting, why are they holding back publication of the long- overdue report from the expert group until then?

The only conclusion can be that Enda Kenny and Eamon Gilmore have agreed on a deeply cynical attempt to try and “lose” the Savita scandal in the pre-budget hype that will then be dominating the political/media cycle.

Just one week out from news of Ms Halappanavar’s agonising death and the Government is still inflicting unnecessary pain on her grieving family.

Placing one consultant from University Hospital Galway onto the probe into her death would have raised eyebrows, packing the inquiry with almost half its seven members from the small medical institution where Ms Halappanavar died was beyond dumb and stepped into the realm of deliberately offensive.

In an unsteady, and unconvincing Dáil performance during Leaders’ Questions, Mr Kenny announced the inevitable climb-down as he again shielded his beloved Health Minister James Reilly from any blame and passed the buck to the HSE.

We were told Reilly had now “requested” the HSE to drop the Galway trio, but the Health Minister is supposed to be on top of the HSE which he left rudderless by sacking its top brass — so, why did he allow such an unacceptable situation to arise in the first place?

Mr Kenny kept insisting the probe would now be “truly independent” — which implies it would not have been were it not for the U-turn forced on him.

Add the fact that this is such an emotionally charged issue which has gripped the nation and bathed Ireland in a grim light abroad, the Government’s cack-handed response is deeply troubling.

And this “truly independent” investigation still falls far short of the standards required by Savita’s widower Praveen Halappanavar who wants oral hearings held in public, a full discovery of records and witnesses called in under oath and cross examined in public, if he is to co-operate.

His lawyer, Gerard O’Donnell laid out the clear reasons why: “It’s important to remember that he lost his wife while under the care of the HSE. Mr Praveen feels that anybody who is appointed by the HSE or paid for by the HSE to conduct an inquiry into his wife’s death won’t meet the criteria that we would advise him as lawyers of getting to the truth.”

The Dáil went through another shadow debate last night where, as in an attempt by Independents to pass X-case legislation last April, timid Labour TDs refused to back the platform they were partly elected on, and Fine Gaelers just wished the whole unpleasant business would go away by itself.

Ms Halappanavar’s memory really does deserve better than this.