Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Taoiseach may recall how, on last Wednesday's Order of Business, I put to him the comments of the HSE's national director of acute hospitals, Mr. Ian Carter, who warned of further dysfunction if the Government kept taking money out of the system. I raised that issue in the context of the Health Service Executive (financial matters) Bill. I was asking the Taoiseach basic questions about the €666 million that had been cited in the previous day's budget as the amount of savings to be effected in health. I explained to the Taoiseach that there had been a press conference after the budget in which the Minister for Health, Deputy Reilly, did not explain properly from where all of those savings would come.

I then asked the Taoiseach if the figures had been signed off by the director of the Health Service Executive. I asked if they stood over the figures and the Taoiseach said "Of course". We now know, however, that the director of the HSE did not stand over the figures. I want the Taoiseach to correct the record because he misled the House in that regard. Perhaps he thought they had, but they clearly had not because at a meeting of the Committee on Health and Children on the Thursday it was made clear by the HSE director that there would have to be independent verification of the €666 million figure, and in particular of the €113 million that had been put in for probity. Therefore he had not signed off on it. It is unprecedented, and I have never witnessed it before, for a budget to be presented to the House and a formal mechanism put in place to provide for a post-budget independent verification of the figures.

The situation was clouded even more yesterday by the Minister, Deputy Reilly, who is saying that he does not know whether it is between €666 million or €1 billion. He said that is what the independent verification is all about. He said that officials from the Department of the Taoiseach and the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform are coming in to independently verify the figures. He says their job is to verify whether it is €666 million or €1 billion. On Saturday, The Irish Times reported that it was €1 billion. Obviously, the Department of the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Howlin, has been leaking fairly hard against the Minister for Health. Today's Irish Independentreports that the Minister for Health sought €1 billion and went out minus €1 billion, all in the space of 24 hours.

Will the Taoiseach correct the record of the House concerning his statement that the HSE's director had signed off on this health Estimate? Where does the health Estimate stand now?

See this speech in context