Liz McManus (Wicklow, Labour)

Perhaps the question Deputy Twomey wanted to ask is the same as mine. To what cases is the Minister referring? The suspicion is that the legal advice is deliberately being kept hidden, even from the Oireachtas committee charged with the duty of examining the issue in terms of administrative and legislative change. The Minister is giving us a job of work to do without providing the tools to do the job when she refuses to release this information. Will the Minister specify the cases about which she is talking that lead to this difficulty? Until we hear those details she will not convince us 100%.

The Minister knows who these people are because they are in public institutions. Will she describe for us the mechanism for payment? Will she discriminate in favour of people who are alive rather than those who have passed on? Will she publish the legal advices relating to the scheme when it is prepared and has passed through Cabinet? It would be helpful if she provided the details of the legal back-up. We have had to argue the case about the unconstitutionality of a previous Bill. The Minister must accept that it is important that anything done now is put to the test by publication so that we may all have confidence in it.

With regard to what is available to us in the Travers report, the legal advice of the then South Eastern Health Board is censored and delivered to us in a very truncated form. However, according to the report, that advice clearly states the only conclusive solution is the introduction of a comprehensive legislative framework etc. We know that two Ministers knew what was going on and that the Taoiseach was informed about it. The current cost is considerably higher because the Minister responsible did not live up to his responsibilities.

Does the Minister agree there is a major question mark over her predecessor? What the Travers report said about the legal advice of the then South Eastern Health Board cannot be gainsaid. No Minister could stand over total ignorance when such information is available to him and when advisers, civil servants and Ministers of State were at the meeting. Has this not added to the costs in a manner that raises a question mark over his competence to be in Cabinet?

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