Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I repeat that private consumption grew year on year for the first time since 2010. This encouraging development is in line with the figures set out by the Department of Finance. Growth will continue in 2012 and in 2013 for the third consecutive year. As both the Minister for Finance and the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform pointed out in their budget presentations, we are making progress and are on the road to recovery in terms of our economic health, but there are serious challenges ahead.

The Deputy referred to cancer patients. Legislation that was enacted back in 1987 introduced an obligation for patients to pay a daily charge, which is currently set at €75 and capped at €750 or a maximum of ten days. In 2011 the Health Service Executive raised €50 million from that charge. As part of budget 2013 it was announced that the charge would be increased by €5 to €80. The charge applies to each inpatient or day-case patient. The fee is not connected to any particular disease or illness for which a person is being treated and no new charge for cancer patients was introduced here. I remind the House that the charge was increased annually by successive Fianna Fáil Governments in the period 2002 to 2009, with the exception of the election year of 2007, by an average of 12%.

Clearly, there are cases, which have come to my attention, where the discretionary element that always applied in the case of medical cards is being reviewed by the panel of doctors who examine that.

With regard to the pupil-teacher ratio mentioned by the Deputy, this applies for a percentage increase in respect of fee-paying schools. It does not apply in the case of other schools and will not lead to the loss of hundreds of jobs. The education sector is going through a period of quite significant change, and the use of technology should be encouraged far more. The Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, for example, has connected another 286 secondary schools to 100 megabit speed Internet connection and a further 200 were approved yesterday. There are schools where the number of pupils is not large enough to have a range of teachers due to the pupil-teacher ratio that applies. In many such schools where some students wish to do honours mathematics, for example, they can do so through remote connection to schools where teachers can teach online. For the small numbers of pupils in particular schools who might wish to do honours mathematics because of the extra points or because they have a flair for it but because of the number of pupils in the school they do not have a teacher to teach them honours mathematics up to the leaving certificate, the use of technology is of growing interest and importance. That is both cost saving and very effective in the interest of individual or small groups of students in schools where they do not have such specialist teachers.

The Deputy's assertion that the increase in the pupil-teacher ratio for fee-paying schools will lead to the loss of hundreds of jobs is not accurate.

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