Barry Andrews (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

Under the new arrangements, the HSE will aim for a turnaround time of 15 days or fewer for all medical card and GP visit card applications. Emergency applications will be dealt with immediately with a card issuing within 24 hours.

While there are no plans to close any of the local health offices that currently process medical card and GP visit card applications, the process will involve a reassignment of existing staff within the HSE. In this regard, discussions have commenced with IMPACT and SIPTU under agreed arrangements and these discussions are ongoing.

Local health offices will continue to provide advice and necessary supports to people applying for medical cards and GP visit cards. They will also deal with queries of a general nature about the medical card scheme and, along with the HSE national helpline, will handle inquiries from clients in respect of their medical card and GP visit card entitlements.

This is a good example of the type of innovation signalled in the transforming public services programme announced by the Taoiseach last November. It demonstrates how the HSE can deliver improved services within the more limited resources available in a way which meets the needs of citizens in a modern society.

The number of persons with a medical card has increased by more than 200,000 since the start of 2005. More than 1.35 million people are now covered by the card and more than 85,000 people have a GP visit card. In excess of 32% of the national population are covered by the GMS scheme.

The HSE service plan for 2009 highlights the impact of the continued growth in numbers on the live register and uptake of demand-led schemes as an ongoing challenge for 2009. Consequently, it has provided for an additional net increase of 81,000 medical cards and 46,000 GP visit cards in 2009. I am satisfied the centralisation of the medical card application process will ensure a more efficient service for the public during these challenging times.

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