Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I agree 100%.

There will be a Revised Estimate next week in respect of the health budget. We talked yesterday at a meeting of the finance committee about how, on an accrual basis, that may be as high as €1.5 billion if we are led to believe what is in the media and, on a cash basis, what is needed between now and the end of the year could be €1.1 billion. None of that is being provided for next year in terms of ELS. The ELS being provided for next year relates to what would happen normally, if there were no deficit whatsoever, so the only way you can think about this is that all of that is going to disappear. None of it is going to be carried over, yet the CEO of the HSE is saying nearly all of it, despite what he has done through the recruitment embargo, is going to appear again next year because it is driven by inflation and demand.

That is why I am saying this to Mr. Kinnane, hand on heart, about what he is presenting. I do not know whether it is for political reasons or whether it is because officials in the Department are saying they know it is a work of fiction but that they will just do another Supplementary Estimate, which is probably going to be €2 billion next year, but this is a complete work of fiction. The health service cannot stand still next year on an additional €708 million. Everybody knows that and I do not know why there is an attempt to pull the wool over our eyes. I do not mean Mr. Kinnane personally, given these are political decisions and I do not mean any offence to him personally or any of his officials. These are political decisions but this is a work of fiction. The CEO of the HSE seems to be saying he is not going to go along with it and that he is not going to present a service plan suggesting we can do this. He went to the extreme of writing to the Minister saying the Government should be fully aware of the consequences of this, yet this is what was presented.

I will tell Mr. Kinnane why that is the case, in my view. It is because the Government has agreed to this target, which it keeps missing, of about 5% expenditure. It went up to 6% and felt it could not go any further than that, and this is really a case of nod-nod, wink-wink. The belief is that if we do it, the health budget will again be exceeded and we will write a Supplementary Estimate again this time next year, but that just makes a mockery of the whole thing. For officials and professionals within the Department of Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform, it really raises questions about the assessment that has been made. Will Mr. Kinnane explain how the deficit in health this year is going to disappear?

We know the €708 million, even if we agree that is the figure for next year, is made up of public sector pay, inflation and all the rest. If there is €1 billion-----