Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I have three quick questions. If the overrun in health stays at its current level - 5.8% was projected and 6.7% is the outturn - there will probably be an overrun of about €158 million. The impact on this is massive. It has been budgeted to recruit as many as 1,300 nurses, 100 of whom are in the north west, but the posts are not being filled. The list of people waiting more than 18 months has increased by 2,000 persons. As many as 3,600 people in Donegal are waiting more than a year and a half. It does not make economic sense that we starve the service. I know that the Minister will reply that this is the biggest health budget ever and all the rest, but I am a year older than I was last year as well. The reality is that 1,300 nurses were budgeted for, but they are not being accounted for and, therefore, procedures are not being carried out in hospitals. We need to deal with this matter. The simple idea that, above anything else, we must stay within budget does not make budgetary sense and is definitely not patient centred.

On the insurance industry, I refer to the point that I made, which is the same point that was made by the Alliance for Insurance Reform, in particular. When AXA XL relocated here as a result of its Brexit contingency plan, two Ministers issued press statements. We are asking the Government to meet the insurance industry. It is not just a case of high premiums, but that people cannot get any price. In motor insurance, if a person gets three refusals, the industry must give a quote, but the same does not apply to public liability. We need to consider solutions and there are no easy or quick-fix solutions. There probably needs to be market intervention at this stage because we cannot allow the entire sector to go.

I do not have the summer economic statement with me, although I did try to bring it up on my phone, but in terms of Brexit, looking at option B, the no-deal Brexit scenario, there is a €2.8 billion package for year one, and then for every other year for the next four years there is a package totalling in the region of €3 billion.

The Minister may correct me if I am wrong but it demonstrates that within five years, in a no-deal scenario with a budgetary package in the region of €3 billion each year, the State's finances will be back in surplus. Is that correct?