Dáil Sketch:The health service is unwell. Quick! Quick!, writes Miriam Lord. Is there a Taoiseach in the house? The health service is in a bad way. Let him through, he's a politician! This is not the way things work.
When events go wrong at the medical coalface, people should not expect a Flying Bertie service to arrive and make things better.
When procedures do not go according to plan, the Taoiseach cannot be expected to turn up in theatre, fully gowned-up and snapping on a pair of surgical gloves, ready to save the day.
That seems fair enough.
Explaining the basic fundamentals of running an efficient health service is becoming a daily struggle in the Dáil for Bertie Ahern. He was at it again yesterday and, clearly, finds the process very frustrating.
From his position there are just three simple rules - the doctors do the curing, the HSE does the managing and the Government provides the money.
End of story. That's how he sees it.
In fact Bertie can't, no matter how much the Opposition strives to broaden his horizons, see matters any other way.
You pay the money and others do the work. Surely we all understand that? Hardly his Government's fault if the staff can't organise their work properly.
It's just impossible to get good help these days, no matter how much money is on offer.
Lately, it always seems to come down to money with the Taoiseach.
Leadership or responsibility never comes into it. It didn't yesterday, either.
This is what has Opposition leaders fuming. Catastrophe follows upon catastrophe in the health service. Bertie always has an explanation.
It might be statistical, or something to do with staffing levels, or the mundane reality that stuff happens.
The latest storm centres on women given false results following breast cancer scans.
This time, the tentative reason advanced by the Taoiseach is alleged human error.
But the atmosphere in the Dáil chamber yesterday conveyed a sense that the situation in the health service is far more grave than Bertie would like people to think.
An air of helplessness pervaded the Taoiseach's responses, and it seeped through to the rows of Government backbenchers arrayed behind him.
They looked deeply unhappy. Their constituents are worried. They don't know what to tell them. Trumpeting the amounts of money their boss is willing to spend cuts no ice with women who have lost confidence in the State health service.
No. Not a very enjoyable morning for the backbenchers. Then Bertie proceeded to make it worse.
It's the money again. This whole salary thing is niggling at him. He couldn't resist bringing it up again yesterday.
As he did, his backbenchers winced and held their breath, wondering what sort of hole their Taoiseach was going to dig for them this time.
You could see it on their stricken faces: why on earth mention the war? The lads had already been getting it in the neck over learner drivers and the worrying state of the health service. A reminder of the massive pay increase for Bertie and his Cabinet was all they needed.
After a week spent trying to avoid discussion of the generous rise awarded to their officer corps, it looked like the issue was finally beginning to fade. Then Dr Bertie blundered back into it.
He was pointing out that the Government provides the best of facilities to the medical profession, and pays them very well for their services. Accordingly, they should get on with their work.
In fact, some of them earn more than he does, he sniffed, sounding rather miffed.
This is how he put it: "We provide modern facilities to very well paid people in this country, vast majority of them would form (sic) far more excessive than I would as a salary." Bertie is pulling in a mere €310,000 a year.
"Give 'em the money and wash your hands!" snorted Fine Gael's Bernard Durkan, muttering about responsibility.
But as far as Bertie is concerned, good rates of pay equal good performance. Look at his Government.