Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I think the witnesses for appearing before the committee and giving information on very important issues.

I recognise what was intended to happen on the medical card qualification and the extent to which that is affected by the rent-a-room scheme. However, I bring to the attention of the committee again what I have said previously. A very tight regimes runs for income levels for qualification for medical cards. Out of four or five cases I have had one resolved. That was an unfortunate case, but it is only temporary. A very peculiar thing I have noticed though is in the event of a hospital mishap I am dealing with, I would have thought that it would be urgent to ensure that the person involved be accommodated in any way possible. This has not happened and it has been dragging on for months and will continue to drag on. I am going to bring it up at a different level. It is an embarrassment and it should not have happened. Details have been with the medical card section for quite a long time. I strongly object to the way the patient is being treated because there are extenuating circumstances. These are the responsibility, in the first instance, of the health services. I ask that this matter be looked at as a matter of urgency. I will not name the patient as I am sure they are well known to the medical card system.

The other issue I want to raise is that of new medicines becoming available and the extent to which they are being processed and whether they will be processed on time. I want to point out the issue of the pharmaceutical sector and the drop in taxation levels as a result of a reduction in volumes and a knock-on effect on profits. I cannot quite understand it because much of the manufacturing is done here, as we know. It is a strong sector that we very much rely on. I cannot understand why there has been a drop-off because the demand for pharmaceuticals is ever-increasing. The two situations have to be addressed. Whatever measures necessary have to be taken to ensure an adequate supply in the marketplace, now, not in six months or a year, but now. The other one is to ensure that the new drugs coming onstream, which can make a huge contribution, should be made available as quickly as possible by the health service. It is not acceptable that we wait until the end of the winter when the bugs have descended upon us to find out what the answer is. The answer has to be provided now. We need the supply now. We need access to the new drugs now. We need them processed as quickly as possible and we need the patients of the country who depend on them to be able to access them . Some of these drugs are as basic as penicillin. It is a vital drug, which is manufactured in this country as well. We should not have to apply anywhere for it.

I listened to a representative of the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland on radio a few days ago.

She said we are a very small blip on the European map. That may well be the fact but we are part of the internal market, the Single Market, and we are entitled to the same entitlements in every aspect of industry, medicine and everything else as everybody else throughout the European Union. There can be no exceptions made or explanations put forward to counter that. Although the representative on the radio was only reflecting what she was told, that is not the case. Every part of this country, even the most remote parts, has the same access to the Single Market as Paris, Brussels or anywhere else. No situation can arise where we can become subject to an explanation that we are only a small blip on the map with a small population in a small country and so on and so forth, and it is the bigger market that has to be looked at. This is the bigger market. We are in it. It is the Single Market. Every single citizen in this country is entitled to their fair access to what is going on and what is available in the Single Market, with no exceptions. If there are exceptions, we want to know about it and we want to discuss them as soon as possible. That is my contribution. I will take an answer if there is an answer forthcoming. If not, I want action in any event. One could say I am an angry old guy at the moment. That is correct.