Martin Ferris (Kerry North-West Limerick, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It seems that nowadays I stand up here more often to talk to, and even plead with, Ministers about the distress I see in my constituency and the people who approach me for help. The single, clear message coming from this Government is that if one is in trouble, one is on one's own. If one's mother needs care, if one's child has special needs, if one has lost one's job, if one has an accident, if one's child gets into trouble, whatever it is, do not come looking for support or help from the Government. No, if one has a problem one can pay to resolve it or go away, even if that problem is a long-term, terminal, painful or immobilising medical condition or disease. If one has no money to pay, then tough. The Government is about balancing books, the bible according to the Troika, and after that no humanity, solidarity, compassion or ordinary human decency comes into it.

The Minister, the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste have stood in the House and told us, again and again, that there was no change in criteria for issuing or, more commonly, withdrawing discretionary medical cards, even though we know that in 2009 the rate of discretionary medical cards was one in 18, but last year it had dropped to one in 33. The Minister knows this too, and it is a shame on him and the Government. As the election campaign progressed over the past few weeks and Fine Gael and Labour Party canvassers had the audacity to knock on people’s doors, they were told again and again of the suffering caused by the withdrawal of medical cards. They got windy and the Minister got a roasting at a Fine Gael parliamentary party meeting. That is when we began to hear about a third tier and the amazing discovery by the Minister of some hard cases which were causing concern, and he then referred to administrative problems.

I would love to know what he calls a hard case. What is the definition of a hard case around the Fine Gael and Labour Party Cabinet table? Would it be, for example, like a couple in my constituency, where she has asthma and he has a heart condition and high blood pressure? Their cards were taken away and during every one of the months it took to get them back, they had to make a hard decision. What decision was this? It was which of them would get their medication and which of them would hope for the best, as they could not afford to fill the prescriptions for both of them. They came to the decision that her inhalers were more important. This man ended up in hospital with a stroke as he had gone without his blood thinning medication for so long. Would this be a hard case?

Deputy Doherty mentioned Jackie's story. Jackie is my friend and neighbour. I am well acquainted with her story and have been for quite a considerable time. It is a hard case. This woman is going to her death. She was denied prescriptions by the Government and the HSE. Would this be a case that causes concern for the Government?

Leaving aside human compassion and decency, it saves no one any money that instead of giving the man I mentioned his medication, the health service now has the greater cost and use of resources of treating him in hospital for a stroke. This man will end up in rehab, probably in Dún Laoghaire. There is not a Deputy in the House, or a canvasser going from door to door, who has not heard about the suffering, hardship and stress that this is causing.

In the circumstances, I see how the Minister was quoted in the Irish Examiner as stating "My main concern is two-fold — number one, that people get the care they need but number two, to protect the taxpayer." To protect the taxpayer against what? Does he really expect us to believe that people are faking illness to get a medical card in order to pull off some sort of a scam? In his anxiety to root out some kind of imaginary scam on behalf of the taxpayer, he has ignored the advice of those on the front-line of the health service: the family doctor, the local GP and the men and women who call again and again for the resources to run a proper primary care service. Best practice internationally, expert reports and recommendations and simple cop on indicate that a properly funded and resourced primary care service is the least expensive and most efficient way to keep the population healthy. It is the way to go to stop people getting seriously ill and the most effective vehicle for health promotion. When I go home this week I will see Jackie again, as I do every week. What the Government has done to Jackie and the couple I mentioned is an indictment on what it has done to the people of Ireland.

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