Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)

I present the apologies of the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney, who has asked me to take this debate.

I thank Deputy Wall for raising this issue. I had the pleasure of being in his town today and I congratulate everybody involved in the very successful National Ploughing Championships.

Government policy is to support older people to live in dignity and independence in their own homes and communities for as long as possible. Where this is not feasible, the health service supports access to quality long-term residential care where this is appropriate. The Health Service Executive has operational responsibility for the delivery of health and social services, including those at St. Vincent's hospital, Athy.

St. Vincent's is a 199 bed long-stay unit in the Kildare-west Wicklow community care area. Staff shortages, due to recruitment issues and maternity, sick and annual leave, have put continuing pressure on supporting beds at St. Vincent's Hospital. HSE senior management, in consultation with local senior staff decided, in the interest of the residents and overall service integrity to introduce service consolidation arrangements. This consolidation required the relocation of patients from one unit, St. Camillus ward, to existing vacancies in a number of other units within St. Vincent's. This is to ensure that the highest standard of care will continue to be provided to all patients in a safe and secure environment. I believe the House will agree that the safety and care of the residents is our first concern. Most importantly we must consider what is in their best interests. Each hospital, local health office, manager, clinician and other people working in the health services has a responsibility to provide the best possible service to patients, their families and other clients of the health services.

The HSE has confirmed that it is taking steps to ensure that the closure of this ward will not result in a reduction in the number of beds available in the region. It has arranged to make additional private nursing home beds available to both community and hospital patients in order to minimise the impact of the planned changes. In addition the executive has confirmed that the hospital has catered for all scheduled respite services. The Nursing Homes Support Scheme Act was signed into law on 1 July 2009. Certain sections of the Act have been commenced to enable the National Treatment Purchase Fund, NTPF, to immediately begin price negotiations with private nursing homes. It is the Minister's intention to commence the scheme for the public in the final quarter of the year.

The scheme will equalise State support for individuals in public, voluntary and private long-term nursing home care. This will meet one of the objectives of Towards 2016, namely, that State support should be indifferent as to whether a person is in public or private care. Individuals will contribute to their care based on their income and the value of their assets. No-one will pay more than the cost of his or her care. There are approximately 20 private nursing homes with more than 1,000 beds spread across the Kildare-west Wicklow region. The introduction of the scheme should eliminate the financial need for people to seek public nursing home care. This will allow older people to choose to receive residential care in a wider range of centres, including those which would be closer to their homes and families.

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