25/10/2016 BBC Newsline

Good evening, our top stories on BBC Newsline tonight:

A warning that the health service is at breaking point

as the latest review into our local health care system is published.

The reality is that the current model is unsustainable. If we

continue to provide services in the same way, using the current models

of care, command projects and is sure that ten years from now the HSC

will meet 90% of the entire Executive budget.

A former Ireland rugby international has his convictions

A young man who killed a pensioner while driving and using a mobile

phone app is jailed in what's thought to be the first

Also tonight: How the fall in sterling after the Brexit vote

And there's a bit of rain in the forecast mainly for tonight,

Another major report has been published

into Northern Ireland's health care system.

The Minister told the Assembly that change is critical

as the system is at breaking point.

Responding to the Bengoa health review, Michelle O'Neill says

she has come up with a ten-year plan to transform services.

Our Health Correspondent Marie Louise Connolly reports.

Matt is 88 years old and is about to have a procedure which will improve

the condition of his heart. He has travelled around 50 miles to the

Royal Victoria Hospital to have it done. I really do not mind

travelling from Cookstown to Belfast to get a good service. And to be

well looked after. This procedure is only available in Belfast. The team

of experts is based in one place and patients are expected to travel to

them. I think that is the patter and all across the western world. They

get the best treatment, patients unfortunately for that little bit of

convenience, they get better outcomes. It is that idea of

centralising certain services, such as cancer and cardiology, that the

Minister would like to see happening across all the health trusts. At the

moment, expertise is being spread too thinly across too many buildings

and at all costs money. The reality is that the current model is

unsustainable. If we continue to provide services in the same way,

using the same current models of care, demand projections show that

ten years from now the HSC will need 90% of the entire Executive budget.

So, leaving the politicking aside, what does this tenure planning for

the public? There will be a short-term plan with a significant

cash injection to address the current waiting list problem. There

is to be significant investment in primary care, or GP services. Also

more GP training places, and more advanced nurse practitioners in the

community. GPs are to have named district nurses, health visitors and

social workers to help bring care back into the community. Well the

report does not mention hospital closures, it says services with in

the five health trusts will have to meet certain criteria to prove they

are viable. That could be the potential sticking point, as some

hospitals may lose the services such as emergency departments or stroke

facilities. According to the man behind the plan, that warming

politicians having to be brave. That is one of the reasons why we did a

political format where be approved some principles and all parties

basically agreed on some principles and all parties basically agreed,

the principles, which means that hopefully the opposition would not

be using, because of the importance of this change for the people in

Northern Ireland, will not be using Health and Social Care Act as a

political football. The Health Minister's trump card is having her

plan endorsed by the Executive. Side-by-side, both parties spoke

with one voice. We either try to manage the change or are we either

manage the chaos that would come if we did not tackle the huge issues

that there are. Problems of such magnitude cannot be fixed overnight.

At least today marks the start trying to fix them.

In a moment, we'll hear from the Health Minister

and get more analysis from our Health Correspondent.

But first, how has today's news been received

and what are the chances of these plans gaining support

From Stormont, here is our Political Correspondent Stephen Walker.

Two reports with one hopeful outcome, changing the face of health

and Social Care Act. The Health Minister came to the Assembly to

unveil her vision and bass there was a broad welcome from some, there

were a series of questions. How can the Minister come to this house with

grant proposals that she has not costed? What is the costing of what

the Minister is proposing? Surely any proposal needs to be costed

before it is embraced. That theme was picked up by the SDLP. I was

flagging the previous Health Minister for knowing the cost of

everything and the value of nothing and I have no doubt about how much

Michelle O'Neill values the health service and the workers in it,

however today in the chamber she demonstrated that she did not really

know much about the cost of anything. The Ulster Unionists were

also critical of what they saw as a lack of detail. I would very much

give this a cautious welcome because the devil is in the detail. We

cannot start the journey with the fuel tank half empty. We need more

budget, costings and detail and putting the patient is front and

centre of everything that we do. Political consensus is seen as key

to achieving health reform. Some see today is a good starting point. We

will very much support the reforms. We signed up to the principles of

six months ago and we do think this is the right direction of travel,

but we will be holding the Minister to account. We do want transparency

and decision making and accountability if she does not

deliver on it. Today marks an important day in the history of how

health and Social Care Act in Northern Ireland can be planned.

Together, these two reports amounted to some 50 pages and 32

recommendations. The Health Minister knows change requires looking at

tough questions, questions but her political opponents suggest she has

failed to answer. Well, the Health Minister

Michelle O'Neill is with me. Minister, this plan of yours is big

on ambition but some are saying it is very short on detail. Let's deal

first of all with the most pressing issue, waiting lists. What are you

going to do to address them? Happy to address that, but I can I just

say it is a good day for the health service. We have the Executive, for

the first day mother, endorsing a ten year plan that will bring

difference to individuals' legs. This is about getting better health

outcomes for those who are elected to represent. This is a system that

is challenged and needs to be transformed. In the short term, we

need to address waiting lists by short-term investment, making sure

we are at full capacity. But also that didn't work out to the

independent sector to make sure patients could seem a timely manner.

We are getting money through the Executive. It has today endorsed

this plan in the recognition that in order to deliver this we have to

achieve additional funding. So we are going to need additional funding

that I am actively engaged in conversation with the finance

minister and my Executive colleagues and we will be announcing our

budget... Easy this is a good news story. A lot of people agree, but

there will be a lot of people on the waiting list, 225,000 people waiting

to see a consultant, who will have looked to you for answers to

Inverclyde and they did not get any in this report. What people got

today, the population, is that we are going to work very seriously and

provide the political leadership necessary to transform Health and

Social Care Act so we cannot keep doing things the same and expecting

different outcomes. We all agree the waiting lists are unacceptable and

the way to transform that is to invest in the short-term. If we do

not transform in the longer term, it will get worse. A bigger role for

the private sector? -- the private sector? I will not leave them

waiting on waiting lists. If I can buy in the service elsewhere, that

is a short-term measure because I want to be is that we have a health

service free at the point of delivery based on need, provided

in-house. The reality is that if we are to move forward, we are going to

have to reduce the number of acute hospitals we have in Northern

Ireland. Are you prepared to make the hard decisions? As Health

Minister, I have many a hard decision today and I am prepared to

show the leadership necessary. So, will you don't downgrade hospitals I

am not saying that you are doing this but we do not need to get into

a conversation about structures. This is about delivering better

outcomes. How does that look in the future? More GPs, more nurses, more

allied health professionals, more district nurses, social workers on

the ground delivering primary care. People should not need to go to

hospital, that should be the last port of call. The reality is we have

been grappling with those by the last 15 years. We have had three

other reports. Patience is running out and your saying we need another

ten years to sort it. It is very clear that if we do not do anything

the health service will be bankrupt and it will be a crisis. We have a

choice to make. Do we want to manage the change? I certainly do. Do we

want political leadership and bringing waiting lists and question

what I do. You know the minute that you identify a hospital that is to

be downgraded, the minute you identify a casualty department to

close, you're likely to lose your political support. There is a

recognition that we have many challenges to tackle and the only

way to do that is to transform Health and Social Care Act. We had a

20th-century system trying to deliver 21st-century health, it is

not going to work. We have a journey we have set out of ten years but

there are immediate action is happening from day one. This is a

fresh start for Health and Social Care Act today. I am looking forward

to the challenge and there are many for as Health Minister, and the

Executive, but I believe we are up for them. This is different than

anything that has come before. I am feeling that from the feedback

today. But I know the Assembly and the public will judge me on

delivery. Big challenges ahead but I am certainly up for it.

Thank you very much for that. Well, our Health Correspondent

Marie Louise Connolly has been working on this story

and she joins us now. I hope this is the reporter to end

all reports but it is only day one. There are too mad to get through. A

lot of reading in these reports, a lot of information to be registered.

But why should this be the one to end all reports? Because of the man

who led the review. You're talking about Professor Bengoa. He knows his

health, he was about health reform and many have said we got the best

in Northern Ireland whenever he came here to advise. He has advised

across the world, he has advised President Obama in the White House,

and he got to grips pretty quickly with Northern Ireland when within 12

months he said that really, to get things done in Northern Ireland,

politics had to be taken out of hell. That was one of the first

measures that he achieved. He also recognises that waiting lists is a

problem, but when I put this to him today, he said compared to the rest

of the world it is not really that there is a problem. That is where I

would disagree with Rafael Bengoa. Instead, I would say that the Health

Minister needs to make a big gesture. She needs to get the public

on board and she needs to make a significant gesture in terms of how

to address waiting lists. My understanding is that is going to

happen in the New Year. What about the opposition parties? What are the

chances of those parties coming on board? It is day one. They're not

going to nail their colours to the mast on day one. They have a lot of

reading to do. The Ulster Unionists, Joanne has said she gave it a

guarded welcome. The SDLP called the lack of detail around funding as

"The spectre of doubt". They were never going to commit on day one.

The Health Minister has the Executive on board. That is a major

trump card. Would it be nice to have the opposition on her side as well?

Yes, would. OK, interesting to see what happens. Thank you very much

for that. Plenty still to come

on the programme: Residents living near Casement Park

give their reaction to the GAA's new design

for the controversial stadium. The former Ulster and Ireland rugby

player David Tweed's convictions for child sex

abuse have been quashed. He had been serving

an eight-year prison sentence. Dan Stanton reports

from the Appeal Court in Belfast. Mr Tweed, your reaction?

57-year-old David Tweed refused to answer questions after being

released from custody early this evening. He was freed after senior

judges at the Appeal Court quashed his conviction. The former

councillor from Ballymena had relatives after the verdict was

given. In 2012, a jury found him guilty of 13 counts of indecent

assault, gross indecency with a child and insight in gross indecency

with a child. The former rugby international had been serving an

eight-year sentence. He was capped four times for Ireland, and played

more than 30 times for Ulster. At the end of today's case, Lord

Justice Gillen said that judges would be given, giving the reasons

in writing for quashing his conviction soon. -- would be getting

there are reasons in writing. A 21-year-old man has been jailed

for 13 and a half months for causing death

by dangerous driving. Edward Devlin had been using an app

on his mobile phone to look at used cars

when he struck a telegraph pole. In a tragic turn of events,

the pole then fell and fatally injured

a 66-year-old man Edward Devlin, seen here leaving an

earlier court hearing, admitted causing death by dangerous driving,

in what is believed to be the first case of its kind in Northern

Ireland, Devlin had been using an app on his mobile phone when the

accident happened. It happened as Devlin was driving along this road

outside Lisbon in October 20 14. Ahead of him, a tank had parked up

along the side of the road. A car slowed down behind it, waiting to

overtake. It was a straight section of road and Devlin should have seen

the obstruction from 300 metres, but he did not. The court heard his

attention was distracted. He was using an app on his mobile phone to

browse through used cars. When he did look up, it was too late.

Swerving to avoid crashing into the car in front, he mounted a verge and

struck a telegraph pole. It fell on top of Ian Bailey, who was standing

outside his house. He was fatally injured and died one month later in

hospital. Today, Craigavon Crown Court heard that Devlin had two

previous convictions for careless driving and has previously been

disqualified from driving for a time. The judge also outlined the

impact that Mr Bailey's they've had on his widow. He said her life had

been blighted by her loss. Devlin was sentenced to 13 and a half

months in prison. He will spend the same amount of time on licence. It

seems low for somebody who has taken another person's life through... Not

just carelessness but dangerousness, because it is dangerous to look at

your mobile phone and it is dangerous to look at it for that a

sustained, lengthy period and not be concentrating on driving, which

should be your primary focus of the time. The judge said this case

highlights the dangers of using mobile phones whilst driving. He

said this is a particularly serious example, because the defendant was

using the Internet to surf online, immediately before the accident. He

said that without mitigating factors, including the defendant's

young age, the fact that he had admitted the offence and the genuine

remorse that he had shown, he would be facing longer imprisoned.

Residents who live near Casement Park in West Belfast have been

giving their reactions to the new stadium planned.

Some are calling it a magnificent opportunity for Andersonstown,

but many local people still have major concerns.

Maggie Taggart reports on the reaction.

Two years ago, the plans to create a huge stadium as Casement Park were

rejected in a High Court decision. Local people were today mulling over

the new plan, which will take 3500 fewer spectators, with a scaled-down

layout and more exits for safety. These are the streets most affected

by Casement Park. The official residence group is not yet ready to

comment on the plans on the record, but I have not gone many, many doors

in his street and spoken to dozens of people and whilst some of them

welcome the limited changes to the plans, others are saying they are

still worried about the crowds, destruction, parking and noise.

Nobody with concerns was willing to speak in front of the camera, but

even those in favour all along and see the original GAA approach was

flawed. Unlike the last time the GAA, when they were not as engaging

with local residents as they could have been, they have pushed the boat

at this time and I am happy with what they are proposing. Bars and

cafes are hoping to read the benefit of a huge development on their

doorstep. It will bring a lot of business and opportunity. The fact

that it is proposed to be a 365 day per year are now, I think, is

beneficial to both the local area and the business people. The

modified scheme is still being presented to local community and

will then have to go back to the planners for approval. -- local

communities. The Justice Minister has reversed plans to close six

courthouses across Northern Ireland. They were all earmarked for closure

under plans announced by her predecessor, David Ford.

The uncertainly over Brexit is currently giving a boost

to business on this side of the border.

The drop in the value of sterling means you get more for your Euro,

and its prompted Southern shoppers to head North to stock up.

But what effect is it having on the Republic of Ireland

Our North-West reporter, Keiron Tourish, has been finding out.

Good afternoon, Daniel speaking, how can I help? Over recent months, the

number of city visitors has been unprecedented. One tourism bodies of

it has been the best year for Hotel occupancy since records began. The

trend now is more people coming into the destination from the border

regions and from the Eurozone, and seeing the euro go further with any

destination. We are going to take a walk on the peace Bridge they are...

And people are travelling from across the world. This group of

Chinese visitors say they will be logging positive stories about their

time here. For Chinese people, we usually know Paris, London and

America. But now we are starting to know others, more interesting places

for hours to find out. So we are starting to come here. One major

shopping centre in Londonderry says euro traders up 50% on this time

last year. Here in Letterkenny, some traders said there is more people

opting to go to Northern Ireland to shop, due to the fall in sterling. I

noticed this Sunday it was very quiet in Letterkenny, a lot quieter

than normal, and my brother, who would shop a lot in the north, he

maintained Gary was packed. We are still being ripped off paying in

Euros. That is my situation, and I will be going north. Family

businesses like this one in Letterkenny the coping with the

currency fluctuation is a way of life. It has more fundamental

concerns about Brexit. They had border is the big worry. We have

enough paperwork to do to send VADS and tax returns to the government

every month, and if they add custom is to that, it will just be a little

bit too much. That is a view echoed across the business sector in

Letterkenny. The last thing you want to see if the reintroduction of the

had border and the restriction of people travelling north and site for

business. The chamber of commerce in Letterkenny says Brexit uncertainty

isn't good for business, and that was reflected in a recent meeting

with local traders. And they talked mostly about the border, the border

crossing, and whether that would change their relationship with the

North, whether it would change their stars's employment status. Those

were the main worries. So, the challenge for the politicians, as

far as many businesses are concerned, is to bring some clarity

to the Brexit debate. What will the future look like, and how will it

affect people's daily lives? On tomorrow's programme,

we're in Newry, where retail business is also enjoying a big

uplift in southern shoppers. Our business correspondent

Julian O'Neill joins them to discover just what kind

of savings they're making. The boxer Katie Taylor has been

in talks to turn professional. She is in those discussions

with Matchroom Boxing, whose manager director is

the promoter Eddie Hearn. Taylor has fought

as an amateur for Ireland since her first

officially sanctioned fight aged 15. She's now 30, and lost her

Olympic Lightweight title this summer, when she was defeated

at the quarterfinal stage. She had been training

with the Ireland squad since Rio but is now expected to make

a decision about her future this week, with the Irish

squad for the forthcoming Women's European Championships

also due to be announced. Glenn Irwin was

the star rider at the weekend's

Sunflower Trophy meeting. The Carrickfergus rider completed

a hat-trick of victories, including first place

in the feature race. In safe hands... Not quite! That

little mishap was the only thing that went wrong for Glenn Irwin on a

memorable day. The Ducati rider was unstoppable in

the three Superbike races. Including the main event. Which has always

been on his bucket list to win. We cannot let this trophy go back to

England, Norway. Big race over here, it

cannot let this trophy go back to England, Norway. Big race over here,

it is iconic, I have been coming to it since I was God knows what age,

so it is the one that you want to win and one that we want to keep in

this country so I will do my best, over the next four years hopefully I

can keep coming back and can take this and maybe emulate my dad and

try to get another couple. -- over the next couple of years. And his

brother Andrew was successful in the super sport Grace, a victory which

had been a long time coming. Because I am always raiding in England now,

I would not say it is harder over there, because we have got some of

the brightest guys that I race against here, but it is a relief and

do something I've thought of, and probably other people had not, that

he has not won a race in four years, but it is a weight off my shoulder.

And a lot of medals and trophies for the family to take on.

Pretty impressive! Now, with the weather forecast,

here's Angie Philips. We have been enjoying some nice

weather, it has to be said, over the past few days, isn't likely to

continue? Well, there is some rain in the

forecast, but not huge amounts. It is not all that bad. Some bright

spells but more cloud than we have been used to lately. A fine day,

after the cold start this morning. Even a frost in and around the

Belfast area. Frozen roses at Sir Thomas and Lady Dixon Park in

Belfast. But it was Kate 's budget would stall the crown last night. It

was the frosty as to spot, almost down to minus two Celsius. We had

some mist and fog around but it was the West that thought most of the

fog, stubborn to clear throughout the morning. Generally speaking, the

cloud has been filling them but we still have some pockets, some

breaks, around. Mainly dry through the rest of this evening. Some cloud

around. The winds, at this point, still mainly light. It is all

changed the night. Not as cold as last night because we have a weather

front edging its way in from the north-west. That is going to have

the effect of bringing thickening cloud. Mainly light rain, and a

legacy of the early lead cloud. There will still be some show are

bits and pieces, most of those through the morning time. Some might

age eastwards towards the afternoon, but breaking up, so more dry and wet

weather, really, and once it clear as we might see some bright spells

starting to develop and it is mild air, despite the breeze with

temperatures of possibly 15 degrees. To tomorrow night, the breeze eases.

If you clear intervals to start but the cloud comes in to bring patches

of rain and drizzle later in the night. Another mild night. The

breeze picks up again on Thursday, again a fair amount of light.

Patches of rain from time to time and it is still mild air. As we head

towards the weekend, still in the periphery of this high pressure.

Week weather running through, particularly into Friday, with some

rain. A lot of dry weather, but a fair amount of cloud as well.

Not bad conditions for the next few days.

Our late summary is at half past ten.

You can also keep in contact with us via Facebook and Twitter.