Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the delegation from the HSE. This will be a challenging year. If one looks at the budget overrun last year and the deficit that has been carried forward it certainly puts the HSE in a difficult position.

While we are basing budgets on estimates, there are a number of key issues that we do not know anything about. I do not see anything about the smaller hospital framework and the hospital groupings. Have the estimates and projections been made on reports that nobody else has seen? Has there been a detailed analysis of these reports and have they been taken into account in formulating the estimate of expenditure in 2013? We have seen regional plans and the potential for grouping smaller hospitals, but we have not seen full details of the Smaller Hospital Framework and the funding allocated to it. Is that a central plank of that estimate before us?

May I address the question of medical cards now?