Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Independent)

It may have issues around its membership, about which it is concerned, but we are talking about the overall market. As the Deputy has told me on many occasions previously, he is not interested in which insurance company people belong to and neither am I. Competition in the market has been a very good thing. During the last recession in the 1980s very few people dropped out of private health insurance and some 37% of the population had such insurance at that time.

This policy was enunciated as a way of providing capacity because our public hospital system needs investment. We need more single rooms to ensure the control of infection in particular. We do not have resources available to make that investment. That is a fact. It does not matter who is in this seat, such resources are not available.

Because of the fragmentation of our health service, the massive investment that has taken place during the past decade, in particular, has been targeted at priority areas. One of the key priorities currently is long-term care where many of our current public stock does not and cannot meet the standards laid down by HIQA. That must be a priority for public investment.

People have opposed this policy from the start. It is opposed because the funding will come from the private sector. It was supposed to be the great bonanza for investors. If it was such a great bonanza , it would have been easy for people to get the money much sooner than now. There are big risks associated for the investors and that is why the banking situation has not been easy, particularly with the current difficulties.

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