Joe Sherlock (Cork East, Labour)

I am calling for the Minister for Health and Children to amend the nursing home subvention scheme under sections 22 and 23 of the Nursing Homes (Subvention) Regulations 1993 and to increase the subvention in view of the large number of families forced to avail of private nursing homes for elderly parents due to a lack of public nursing home places.

Owing to the shortage of beds in community hospitals, elderly people who need full-time care and attention must accept beds in private nursing homes. Elderly people are compelled to accept this situation without reference to means, although I am aware of the health liaison officer who organises admission to private nursing homes for people who are fit to be discharged from general hospitals.

In the Cork-Kerry area, 489 people are waiting for enhanced subvention. One can imagine their plight. Their families cannot afford to pay the nursing home fees while other elderly people in the community hospital benefit from free care. We accept that in our community hospitals, but there are private nursing homes in almost every parish and no extra beds have been placed in the community hospitals. People are forced to accept beds in private facilities that are not being paid for by the State. The Ombudsman has stated that if elderly people are entitled to medical care in a hospital, they are entitled to free care. Elderly people should have that long-stay care.

On the Nursing Homes (Subvention) Regulations 1993, the circumstances that are assessed for the purpose of these regulations includes the capacity of a son or daughter aged 21 or over residing in the jurisdiction. The 1993 regulations include assessing the ability of a person in respect of whom subvention is being sought to carry out tasks of daily living on the basis of his or her degree of mobility, ability to dress unaided, ability to feed unaided, ability to communicate, extent of orientation, level of co-operation, ability to bathe unaided and quality of memory and degree of continence. That is outrageous in this day and age when such a major percentage of the population is elderly and requires long-stay care in private nursing homes because there are no extra public beds. I call for the amendment of the Nursing Homes (Subvention) Regulations 1993.

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