Catherine Byrne (Dublin South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The amendment concerns the matters to be considered when amending the minimum price per gram of alcohol. It is proposed that the Minister for Health of the day should also have regard to data from health services relating to alcohol related presentations at health facilities.

The Bill already provides at section 10(5) that the Minister shall have regard to health-related risks and other societal harms caused by alcohol consumption when determining changes to the minimum unit price. In addition, it provides that other matters considered appropriate can be taken into account. The provision as it stands, therefore, allows the Minister for Health to take the following health service databases and research instruments into account in setting the minimum unit price: the Hospital In-Patient Enquiry, HIPE, system, which is a computerised health information system designed to capture hospital activity data - my Department, in association with the ESRI, is engaged with the collection, processing and analysis of inpatient and day patient activity from all public acute hospitals nationally for the HIPE system; the National Self-Harm Registry Ireland, which is a national system of population monitoring for the occurrence of hospital treated self-harm; the Health Research Board, which is the lead agency in Ireland supporting and funding health research and works in collaboration with my Department providing research and an evidence base for alcohol control policies,and the Healthy Ireland Survey, which is a self-reported, interviewer-administered survey conducted with individuals aged 15 and over and covers a variety of topics including alcohol consumption.

As the Bill already provides that the information identified by the Deputy must be considered I do not propose to accept this amendment.