Irish Examiner view: Getting to the root of CHI problem

Harvey Morrison Sherratt's parents, Gillian Sherratt and Stephen Morrison, during a Justice for Harvey March in Dublin city centre in August. Following the announcement of a public inquiry, Ms Sherratt said she was concerned whether it could be effective and bring about change.

Last Wednesday, after a meeting between health minister Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, Tánaiste Simon Harris, and
Harvey Morrison Sherratt’s parents, Gillian and Stephen, the Government confirmed that it would launch a statutory inquiry into the issue of scoliosis and spina bifida care at Children’s Health Ireland (CHI).

Harvey Morrison Sherratt, who had scoliosis and spina bifida, died in July at the age of nine, having waited years for surgery. His parents have been vocal in calling for action on this issue. Following the announcement of a public inquiry, Ms Sherratt said she was concerned whether it could be effective and bring about change.

“We need to look really to get to the root of the problem so that we can address it going forward,” she said. “Because what we don’t want is history to repeat itself.”

It is an indictment of modern Ireland that the activism of people like the Sherratts, who have suffered such a heartbreaking loss, is necessary to bring about investigation and scrutiny in such matters. A properly functioning civil society would have mechanisms in place for such investigation already — or would not allow treatment of children with scoliosis and spina bifida to become so dysfunctional in the first place.

While it is welcome news that these matters will be the subject of a public inquiry, it should be pointed out that Ireland has a patchy record when it comes to the efficiency of such official investigations. Some of our tribunals of inquiry, for instance, ended up taking well over a decade to eventually reach conclusions.

Ms Sherratt said yesterday that her concern with the inquiry is not with how fast it is, but how effective it is.
However, she also pointed out that hundreds, if not thousands, of children across multiple hospital locations may have been affected, which suggests that this inquiry will by definition be a lengthy undertaking — not ideal for children in need of urgent care.

If we are to see positive change for children affected by scoliosis and spina bifida then we surely need to set a realistic time frame for this inquiry.

Flawed logic invites cynicism

The housing crisis continues to scar political careers, long after the collapse of Jim Gavin’s presidential bid in the wake of revelations of his activities as a landlord.

This week we had the much-anticipated — and heavily leaked — housing plan, the details of which seem to have been in the public domain for quite a while. Most readers will be well aware, for instance, that the Government intends to build over 300,000 houses in the coming five years. This means that approximately 50,000 houses will have to be built per year, but the word “approximately” is necessary because yearly targets do not form part of the plan.

This is a major flaw, as the importance of annual targets is immediately obvious: If the Government does not reach them, then it is clearly falling behind on its own commitments — a cardinal sin in politics. Hard numbers are impossible to argue with, particularly when they are targets which have not been achieved.

At yesterday’s launch of the plan, James Browne, the housing minister, said he wanted to get away from yearly targets and to focus on activation, which is hardly an unassailable argument for abandoning those targets. The Taoiseach’s position was no stronger — he stated that under previous housing plans, the Government had been criticised for not setting its annual targets high enough. Neither politician’s case is a convincing one for dropping the annual metric.

The absence of persuasive reasons for the absence of targets leads inevitably to speculation, and to the assignment of ulterior motives. Observers have pointed out that if the Government is focused on the figure of 300,000-plus homes by 2030, then the final evaluation of this housing plan will occur after the lifetime of this administration.

In other words, its ultimate success or failure may not be a factor in the next general election.

Such a reading of the situation may be unfair and unduly cynical, but by dropping the reasonable measurement offered by annual targets, the Government is inviting exactly that kind of interpretation.

Trump's game

The longest US government shutdown in history ended yesterday after 43 days. It means that after six weeks, many federal services and workers can resume full operations, as will the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), a food assistance programme which more than 40m Americans rely on.

President Donald Trump, unsurprisingly, claimed the end of the shutdown as a victory as he signed the spending bill to reopen US government services, surrounded and applauded in the Oval Office by Republican Party acolytes.

It is a given that Mr Trump should award himself the plaudits in this way. Even the most casual observer of the US political scene recognises his innate need to assert his own importance.

However, he may be motivated by other factors in this instance. All this week, extracts from emails sent by the deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein have been widely reported, some of which mention Mr Trump. In one, it is alleged that Epstein described himself as “the one able to take him down”, referring to the president.

While the restoration of normal federal services in the US is timely, the fact that Mr Trump was able to frame himself as the architect of that restoration, this week of all weeks, is surely not an accident. The game of distraction continues.

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