A veiled threat from Health Minister Mary Harney that she could propose the closure of one of Cork's three accident and emergency units has drawn an angry response from healthcare workers and politicians in the city.

Minister Harney made the comments when asked why the Mercy University Hospital's brand new, state-of-the-art A&E unit has remained empty for 19 months while the old unit struggles to cope with the demands placed upon it.

During her visit the Minister also accused staff at the Mercy of "holding the HSE to ransom" over the new A&E unit because they are demanding extra staff to run it. The Director of Nursing at the Mercy, Mary Dunnion said that it was not a simple mater of simply transferring the staff over as the new unit is nearly four times the size of the old one. The Minister described requests by the hospital for 25 extra staff to man the new unit as "unjustified".

Hospital management claim that the HSE knew extra staff would be needed to run the department at the planning stage and are adamant that existing staffing levels would be inadequate to operate the new A&E.

Reacting to the comments, Deputy Lord Mayor and local Fine Gael councillor Patricia Gosch launched a scathing attack on the minister. Cllr Gosch said, "This is a shameful attack on the staff who are in the front line. Does the Minister really believe that requesting adequate levels of funding to provide a decent service is the equivalent of holding the HSE to ransom?

"The truth is that the Minister should look in the mirror if she wants to find the real cause of the problems facing our health service. This is the minister who has spent hundreds of millions extra during her tenure and delivered just 10 extra beds across the country. This is the minister who is presiding over the most damaging and far reaching cut backs in health in over a decade."

She added, "This is also the minister who had unprecedented funds to finally sort out the health service and has failed abysmally to do so. She has added bureaucracy and cut front line services. It is the hard work and dedication of the very people she is now attacking that have prevented the health service from collapsing completely.

"The nurses and doctors at the Mercy deserve an apology from this incompetent and complete failure of a health minister. The only thing this minister seems committed to doing is providing private healthcare operators with state subsidies to benefit the rich".

Cllr Gosch's comments were supported by her party colleague and Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, Bernard Allen who described the situation at the Mercy as "a monument to Minister Harney's incompetence".

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