Sandra McLellan (Cork East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister and his officials and again convey apologies on behalf of Deputy O Caoláin who cannot be here today. I am substituting for him.

The post-budget period in the month of January has seen intensive engagements in the media and in this committee on the overall health budget and on the HSE 2014 service plan. Recently, we had the Minister and HSE officials here for their quarterly meeting with the committee, which immediately followed a dedicated meeting on the service plan. It must be said that there is an air of unreality about all of this. Basic figures have changed for unaccountable reasons and other figures have been plucked from the air and no one can explain from where they came.

The bottom line is that the provision for our health services in budget 2014 was inadequate. The cuts being imposed across our public health system this year are unsustainable. The original memorandum to the Cabinet from Mr. O'Brien on the HSE service plan stated that it will not be possible in 2014 to fully meet all of the growing demands placed on the health services. We know this was changed to read that it will be very challenging in 2014 to meet all the growing demands. This sanitised version was released by the Minister and published in the service plan 2014.

We have repeatedly argued that the health funding plans of the Fine Gael-Labour coalition have zero credibility. A total of €660 million of spending cuts to health were signalled in the budget. That became €619 million in the service plan. We are told the earlier version of the service plan stated that the actual budgetary challenges facing the health service in 2014 amount to €1 billion. Mr. O'Brien confirmed on radio on 22 December that he was given no source for the proposed budget figure of €113 million probity cuts to medical cards, since changed to €23 million in the current service plan, and that it did not come from the Department of Health or the HSE. We have repeatedly asked where that figure of €113 came from and we still have not got a satisfactory answer. Wherever it came from, the Minister was able to reduce it to €23 million in the service plan, apparently without the blink of an eye.

What we do know is that medical card holders and medical card applicants are facing an ever-more restrictive regime. The standard reply from the Minister that more people than ever have medical cards on income grounds does not address the issues here. We all know from our constituencies that very young children and adults have had medical card renewals or initial applications refused in circumstances where previously they would have been granted.

By the end of 2014, almost €4 billion will have been taken out of our public health services since 2008. The health services have already been cut to the bone, and the knife is still being wielded. The ongoing recruitment embargo and job cuts-----