Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

There has been a cull of discretionary medical cards. This is a matter of recorded fact and the figures record that fact. The Minister states he must act within the parameters of the law and he cites the Health Act 1970. The Minister persists in the untruth that there has been no policy change when the facts shout out the contrary. Allow me to give the Minister two precise examples of this policy change. First, I will cite the case of young Katie Connolly, who is a six year old child from Cork whose case I raised in November 2013. Katie had been entitled to a medical card since birth, which was the correct thing because Katie has Down's syndrome and a number of medical complications.

The circumstances of the Connolly household have not changed, they did not win the lottery and indeed, Katie's medical needs have not receded in any way. In fact, if anything, they have increased. Yet young Katie and her family are faced with the situation where her medical card has been taken away. That is the fact.

Young Alex Kyne Coyle is ten years of age. The Minister may have seen him on the television with his mother and father, Annette and Declan. Young Alex has Mowat Wilsonsyndrome. He cannot walk or talk, is tube fed and has seizures. Two or three weeks ago, he, too, had his medical card taken away. These are the facts, these are the cases and, by God, these are hard cases in anybody's language. Yet when we put the motion before the House, we get from the Minister a delusional and robotic response. That is what his response amounts to. I do not know if he is in a complete state of denial. I do not know if he is comfortable simply to look away from these cases to try to make believe that they do not exist. The families who find themselves in this situation do not have that luxury because they care for their children, or in other cases for an elderly parent or relative, day in and day out. The fact of the matter is that policy has changed. Katie and Alex were deemed at one point eligible for their medical cards and then the policy change occurred and their medical cards were taken away.

Deputy Adams has already noted the commendation to the Minister in the Government amendment. He is commended not once, but twice. Whatever about the Minister and his self-belief in his own brilliance in the discharge of his duties, I find it unbelievable and very hard to understand how any backbencher from Fine Gael or the Labour Party could come in to this House, against a backdrop of situations like those faced by Katie and Alex, vote in favour of a motion that commends the Minister so generously, and turn his or her face away from these very hard cases.

I will give the Minister some cause to reflect on words from Declan Coyle, the father of Alex. He sums up the position far more eloquently than any of us here:

I have a dream that the Government policy-makers will remove their hearts of stone and replace them with hearts of flesh. I have a dream that our Government Ministers and politicians will reflect the kind, compassionate, caring, loving people of Ireland and stop attacking the weakest and the sickest. I have a dream that no family with special needs sick children will live in fear and dread. I have a dream that a woman who wrote to me recently about her friend will never have to go through this trauma. Her child was very very sick. She spent days and nights on the floor by the hospital bed. The HSE hounded her and pulled her medical card. Her friend organised a campaign. She got 10,000 to sign up. She organised a silent protest outside Our Lady's Hospital. Eventually the mother of the extremely sick child got her card back. Last March, her beautiful, beautiful child died. Her precious child is now in the arms of the angels.

If the Minister is not amenable to logic and argument from the Opposition benches, I appeal to him to listen to those words from Declan Coyle, from the voice of experience. I ask him again to do the right and decent thing. Do not just talk about the hard cases. Give assistance, succour and return the medical cards to those very hard cases.

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