Liam Twomey (Wexford, Fine Gael)

In the present Dáil, it most definitely will be our last time facing each other on this issue. In case we do not get that opportunity again, I wish her well in the election.

As the Minister will be aware, there is outright opposition from my party to the co-location plan. It is a bad plan. I dislike the way the Minister is going about it. She should not sign these contracts unless she has a new consultants' contract. I want to know will that be the case and will she hold off on signing this. I am also concerned that the HSE has full authority in this regard. If that is what she is stating, the HSE could sign these contracts on the day of the election, regardless of what the Government elected that day feels about this. That is a frightening concept.

The Minister is turning her back on the public health care system in seeking this solution and we need to look at a few matters in that regard. First, I ask the Minister to clarify the full costs of this to the taxpayer. If the public system had to pay for these beds it would cost approximately €1 billion. The Minister states that the solution delivers these 1,000 beds in a roundabout way to the taxpayer for €400 million, which is the amount of the tax concessions she is giving for the construction of these private hospitals. Has she taken into account the €286 million estimated in 2007 in charges for maintenance in private and semi-private accommodation in public hospitals and how will this €286 million be replaced for the taxpayer, who must now make up that shortfall within the €14 billion that is spent on the public health care system?

More importantly, it brings to mind what the Taoiseach stated in December last when BUPA was pulling out of Ireland, that he was not going to let BUPA screw the old people. In this situation, because the Minister is not dealing with reforming the public system and making it work, one can see from the Health vote which we dealt with on Wednesday last that each person pays a significant amount of money. We are paying €4.9 billion——

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