Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 27 April 2021

Select Committee on Health

Estimates for Public Services 2021
Vote 38 - Health (Revised)

Photo of Stephen DonnellyStephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy. The capital funding is right through the budget. There are two big pieces: the Covid funding and the non-Covid funding. The new Covid measures are €2.121 billion and there is a capital allocation within that of €155 million. Then, obviously, there are the new measures of €1.163 billion, and the capital funding in there is an additional €13 million. The capital funding is right through the programme. If we take non-Covid care, for example, there is capital funding in the €276 million which Deputy Cullinane and I were talking about. There is €236 million of current expenditure, which is the money to fund the teams, the staff, the nurses, the doctors and so forth, and then there is €40 million of capital funding in there. It is the same for critical care, sub-acute beds and community beds.

Deputy Shortall and I were talking about e-health. There is current and capital funding but a good portion of the €255 million is ICT infrastructure, which is capital funding. I can get the Deputy a break down, line item by line item, on exactly which is capital and which is current funding in a programmatic way. For legacy reasons, the way we are presented with the figures is not very helpful in breaking out the capital. We get a capital line item, but what we really need to know, which is relevant to the Deputy's question, is how the capital line item is allocated according to the different programme areas, such as acute care, community care, e-health and so on. I will get a detailed note for the Deputy on exactly how that capital funding works across the programme areas.

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