Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Before I get back to dealing with the Bill, because that clearly had nothing to do with it, I wish to say we are trying to change a system that was permitted to become embedded in this country. It was a two-tier health system where if a person had private health insurance, he or she had greater access to health services and if he or she did not have such insurance, regardless of medical need, he or she had to wait. In respect of Deputy Kelleher's remark about people taking advantage, it always astonishes me that people have such foresight on certain issues when they clearly had none on others a few years ago.

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