Catherine Noone (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I wish to ask the Minister for Health to put a procedure in place for the cancellation of a medical card number when issuing a death certificate. It is a simple concept. Recent reports in the IrishIndependent highlighted the problem of GPs claiming more than €1.5 million a year in fees for people who were dead or did not exist. Even prior to that there was a clear need to establish a work practice to increase efficiency. Given that the Minister has said there is no more fat left to cut, this seems to be a simple procedure which could help to us save money. I discussed the matter with the Minister and it was also discussed at today's meeting of the Fine Gael Parliamentary Party. The Minister mentioned that sanctions could be put in place for doctors who did not take people off their medical card lists when they knew a person was deceased. That was in the context of negotiations to allow GPs put babies on their lists. In a sense it was a quid pro quo, in that they would be given discretion to put people on their lists, but they also had to be seen to take them off them at the other side, for want of a better phrase.

There is a much wider debate whereby we could receive more information in-house. There is a responsibility on families when a person dies to return pension books and provide Departments with various information. There is even an onus on them to return medication for safety reasons. One can understand why there might be a difficulty between Departments. A well known comedy show springs to mind in this context where a girl sits opposite the person asking a question and the response is “Computer says no.” In this case we are talking about one Department that has all of the information at its disposal. One organisation, namely, the HSE, issues death certificates and medical cards. Surely to goodness we need some joined-up thinking in this regard.