Representatives from the 221+ Executive Committee have written to the Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly accusing the Government of "playing politics" with the CervicalCheck tribunal.
In the letter sent to the Minister today, the committee which is made up of Lorraine Walsh, Stephen Teap, Vicky Phelan, Rosie Condra, Stephen McMahon, Liz Yeates and Donal Buggy said, "as we have now stated on a number of occasions 221+ has no basis on which to express confidence in the tribunal as proposed at this point".
It said the "statement that the Government will be "reviewing the matter" at its Cabinet meeting next week is we believe just playing politics and pushing out the inevitable conclusion that it is unwilling to address the issue as these women would wish".
The group has asked Minister Donnelly for "clarity once and for all" on the Government's plans in respect of the tribunal and added that the continued 'discussion' on the matter is "getting to stage of being pointless".
The 221+ group said they are "back to learning about Government's views on the CervicalCheck Tribunal, which has been put on pause, at the same time as the public".
"This is on foot of comments in the Dáil yesterday by the Taoiseach which referred to movements on this issue and which also mentioned a further Cabinet review next week.
"Given that this has not been communicated to us, we are coming to the conclusion that Government is now playing politics with an issue on which we believe all politicians should be on the one side with the victims of the State," the group said.
"The position of Government now seems to be that it can "deal with" the Statute of Limitations issue that we raised. That is not what was in the last letter received from you on 8 November? If the position has changed and there is now a basis for the statement made in the Dail yesterday, perhaps you can advise us on what is different and what is proposed?" it said.
The 221+ group said that "time is up" and that they will get in touch with their members before the weekend.
The Department of Health said this evening that it can confirm receipt of a letter from 221+.
It said that the "Minister has had extensive engagement with the group over the past two months in respect of the CervicalCheck Tribunal and other matters".
