Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)

There is a difficulty in signing them at present in that if we had signed them in their original draft form, we would have imposed a charge on people who, traditionally, did not pay a charge. I am referring to the mental health psychiatric area. I propose next week to sign regulations covering the elderly and to deal with the mental health psychiatric aspects in subsequent regulations which will possibly take a further number of weeks. I obviously do not want to impose a new charge on people who, traditionally have not paid a charge. I have asked the Department to expedite the preparation of the regulations covering the care of the elderly because we are losing approximately €12 million a month.

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