Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)

General practitioners make a profit from their operations and I would not expect them to be in business if that were not the case. Bon Secours was the only not-for-profit operator selected but the hospital in question will not proceed and Bon Secours has withdrawn from the project. As a result, none of the eight proposals is in the not-for-profit category.

It would be amazing news to learn that Fine Gael has a difficulty with people making profit. I would not expect Deputy Reilly's practice or any of the other 2,000 general practices to continue operating if they did not make a profit. People will not be involved in providing a service unless they get a return on their labour or investment.

Deputy Reilly indicated he does not understand the problem of having private beds in a public hospital. Each site will have only one accident and emergency facility. I do not want anybody accessing a trauma or accident and emergency service on a preferential basis. An accident or emergency or trauma case should access service based on medical need rather than on a preferential basis. The issue is that 20% of the beds paid for by taxpayers are available to some people on a preferential basis. Staffing these beds costs the hospitals covered by the co-location programme €226 million more than they receive from the insurers. In other words, they receive €74 million per annum from the insurers for providing a service that costs €226 million.

In the case of Beaumont Hospital, which has been alluded to repeatedly, we will provide 180 private beds and the private beds in the public hospital will be converted to public beds and used on the basis of medical need. The hospital will gain in the region of 300 additional acute beds, which is a very good deal. The co-located facility will be involved in training and research and development because, under the medical practitioners legislation, we are extending training to the private providers as well as providing training in the public system. We live in a country where, as everybody has acknowledged, 53% of people have private health insurance. Why do they have it? It increased from 37% when the economy was a third of the size it is today. This economy has tripled in size during the past ten years. We have double the number of people at work. Private health insurance for many, including factory operatives, which would never have been the case previously, is paid for as part of their employment package. We have a new group of individuals involved, some of whom are quite young. I dealt with this issue in my previous job during the skills shortage. Part of the employment package included the provision of private health insurance for employees.

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