Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Minister said the policy will not be changed overnight. It was changed overnight. Legislation was not introduced to take the discretionary medical cards from approximately 30,000 people over recent years. It got so bad the Minister of State, Deputy Alex White, said that there was no such thing as a discretionary medical card. He has said that on the record and now the Minister has come in here and faithfully outlined all the discretionary cards that are again in the system. We either have discretionary medical cards or we do not. The Minister is experienced enough and around here long enough to know that we always had discretionary medical cards, and it was covered under the Health Act 1970. There has been an attempt of late to try to muddy the waters regarding the legislative validity of all that and hence the need to do all these reviews. The Minister of State, Deputy Alex White, stated on the record of the House that there never was discretionary medical cards but of course there was. There is no question that someone took budgetary decisions to get savings in the Department of Health.

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