The Opposition have accused the Department of Health of a cover-up after it emerged that a warning about problems with the cancer service in Portlaoise was sent to the then Minister six years ago.
The Oireachtas Health Committee was told of a letter to then Health Minister Micheál Martin in April 2002 from consultant surgeon Peter Naughton, warning of very serious shortcomings in Breast Cancer services in Portlaoise Hospital.
The existence of the letter had previously been denied and it was not produced on foot of a Freedom of Information request from a newspaper.
After the existence of the letter was confirmed, Minister Mary Harney told the committee she and her Secretary General would go back and investigate the situation.
In the Dáil, Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny claimed it would appear that someone had tampered with the file in an attempt to cover up.
The Tánaiste, Brian Cowen, said that was a very extreme conclusion to draw at an early stage of the discussion.
Labour leader Eamon Gilmore said he would be raising this matter in the Dáil next week, and that if the principle of ministerial accountability is to mean anything, Minister Martin must make himself available for questioning on the matter.
Fine Gael Health spokesperson James Reilly said his party would also be seeking answers, to find out why Minister Harney said there was no letter and why it was unavailable under FOI.
Harney defends establishment of HSE
Minister Harney has been defending the establishment of the Health Service Executive.
Ms Harney told an Oireachtas Health Committee that a unified delivery service had been long overdue.
She said the country would not be in a position to have eight designated centres of excellence without the establishment of a unified health service such as the HSE.
She said the HSE was only three years old and that she strongly believed the HSE had the capacity to make sure the problems identified in the reports into breast cancer services in the Midland Regional Hospital in Portlaoise could be put right.
Professor Brendan Drumm said he had absolutely no disagreement with comments made by the author of one of the reports.
Speaking on RTÉ Radio's Morning Ireland, Dr Ann O'Doherty said the level of inevitable delayed misdiagnosis found at Portlaoise was six times higher than the acceptable 1% level.
Professor Drumm said her comments related to a high quality symptomatic service with triple assessments and that was why the HSE was trying to set up these centres of excellence.
Mr Reilly said the Fitzgerald Report showed there was an absolute failure of the HSE at all levels.
Labour Party Health Spokesperson Jan O'Sullivan said that unless the process and procedures were in place then patients would suffer.
The Health Minister said that Professor Tom Keane, who is now in charge of cancer strategy, was in the process of agreeing a new common referral method.
The methos would separate the urgent from the non-urgent so that those who really need a mammogram would have access to it quickly, she said.
Dr O'Doherty, author of one of yesterday's three critical reports, said women should not be put off going to centres of excellence.
The families of two of the women whose breast cancer diagnoses was delayed at the Midlands Regional Hospital in Portlaoise have called for key members of the medical staff of the hospital to be interviewed so that a full explanation of what happened can be established.
The Irish Country Women's Association supported the call and said Prof Drumm and Minister Harney had both failed in their responsibility for the safety of the women involved.
