Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael)

A few weeks later, however, all that has been forgotten. Speaking from both sides of one's mouth at the same time is a path well trodden by Fianna Fáil backbenchers over the years.

One of the most fundamental questions in this debate was posed by Deputy McManus, although it was not answered by the Minister of State. Since May, she has been attempting to elicit a response, by way of correspondence, concerning the statutory basis for this proposal. The Minister said the Government's initial decision conforms to section 10 of the Health Act 2004. It has taken them eight weeks to come up with that pathetic explanation, which goes to the heart of this problem. I believe the Government is making it up as it goes along. It has not thought through any of the consequences that will follow once our land is handed over, even by way of lease, to private for-profit hospitals. A Government decision was taken 18 months or two years ago, which has no statutory basis. We could face litigation from any of the unsuccessful bidders for each of these hospitals. In addition, we could face litigation on EU competition grounds from any of the existing private hospitals which bought their own land ten or 15 years ago because of this preferential deal that is now being given to new private hospitals on public lands. If the Government is going into this Frankenstein scenario, as Deputy Gormley called it six months ago, it should do so with its eyes open. The Government could quite quickly find itself in courts up and down the country and I have not heard a legitimate statutory or legal reference point, bar the kind of limp excuse I heard from the Minister tonight.

My party has no problem with private money in medicine. I would have no great difficulty, in principle, with the Government allowing private builders to construct a hospital and lease it back to the State, provided the State runs the operation. We have no problem with public private partnerships, PPPs, in the construction of new schools, but this proposal is like handing the schools over to the private sector tomorrow. There is no argument for such a course of action and it has never happened before. Schools are built by the private sector but are still controlled by Marlborough Street and the same principle should apply when it comes to hospitals.

Last night the Minister said this unified model of public and private hospitals working side by side will benefit everyone. Do people actually believe that? In the real world, will public patients receive exactly the same treatment as private patients? Such a suggestion is absolute rubbish, as every Member of this House knows. The two-tiered system of health care that exists at the moment is deliberately beneficial to private patients and this will continue.

The notion that intensive care beds will be divvied up between public patients and private patients is rubbish. If there is only one intensive care bed and both a public patient and private patient need it, who will get it? If an anaesthetist is working at 2.30 a.m. and calls come from both the private hospital and public hospital, where will he or she go? This is all on the basis of the service agreement the Minister spoke of, yet her chief executive officer in the HSE suggests the HSE will be in competition with such ventures with no unified system. This, Sir, is more of the same from the Government, thinking things up as it goes along, putting things in the public domain when caught on the hoof.

The Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney, revealed the new piece of the jigsaw to the House last night that the green light for this project has been by the National Development Finance Agency, NDFA. This is a new piece of information and I would like to hear from the Minister in the coming days how it came about. Was it as a result of this Private Members' motion that the National Development Finance Agency suddenly produced its report, like a rabbit from a hat, stating that this is fine and should proceed? This report still has not been published and we have not received a copy. I request that the Minister immediately send a full copy of the report to the health spokespersons on the Opposition benches. I want that report in the public domain. The Government, surprisingly, could not produce a copy of this report for the past six months but, hey presto, the election is over and the report has emerged.

Are people fools? The 52% of the population with private medical insurance will pay greatly for this proposal and they have seen their premiums double in the past ten years. Premiums will double again because of this stroke that is being played.

The Minister argues that locating two hospitals on one site means consultants will go merrily back and forth between hospitals rather than whizz around town wasting time. There is nothing to prevent consultants from working in three or four hospitals.

The majority of people oppose this proposal because it is a tax wheeze that is deeply contrary to their wishes. The majority of Deputies elected to this 30th Dáil object to and have taken stances against this proposal. It is now time for Deputies to put their money where their mouths are, honour the mandate they received from their constituents and reject this proposal, which will have drastic consequences for public health care for a generation to come.

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