John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)

The then Minister, Deputy Martin, was not informed and he got away scot free. We are now left with this mess and the Bill which has to be enacted. I want to go through some of the sections of the legislation because while it seems we have a framework, we could still be heading for the courts. We are looking at patients' private property accounts. In this context I want to mention something I have raised before. It seems the PD element of the Administration is pushing this, but there are problems on the horizon as regards the Government's approach. It is quite clear that while incomes in Dublin are 15% higher, homes there are also 15% higher. In other words, means testing care provision on the basis of a State-wide fixed figure would be triply unfair. Many of my constituents will be burdened with this in the future. Dublin families have paid a disproportionate amount of stamp duty revenue, suffered greater indebtedness and are now, in effect, being taxed on the basis of the paper value of a home that is entirely eroded because any replacement for it must ordinarily be found in the same market. That will come back to haunt certain people in the PD ranks of Government, who may know patients living in high-valuation properties, who will forfeit these assets, and their children will suffer as well.

As regards the appointment of an outside company I begin to wonder where is the Civil Service. We have a Civil Service to do a job and all we are getting is a continual outsourcing of business. We see from the public private partnerships in action throughout the State that they do not necessarily work, either for the benefit of the citizens or the State. At a recent meeting at Dublin City Council, the City Manager, Mr. John Fitzgerald, who has performed very well, was quite candid in stating he did not believe the private sector could perform any better than the Civil Service. Why do we continue to give out work to private bodies? It costs the taxpayer a great deal more in the long run. Taking just this element, already we are in difficulty. The Minister of State made it clear in his contribution that tenders were sought an initial procurement process was undertaken by the HSE in the latter half of 2005. There were 11 expressions of interest for the design and administration of the repayment scheme and three were short-listed.

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