Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The difficulty we have is that the Minister got it spectacularly wrong when he announced that his intention was to introduce a cap on private health insurance that would only affect gold-plated policies. With all due respect to the Departments of Health and Finance, the definition of "gold-plated" leaves a great deal to be desired. The vast majority of ordinary families who struggle daily to purchase private health insurance are finding that the cap on the tax relief is affecting their ability to continue to fund their premiums.

I want to know what discussions the Departments had. Was there an examination of the broader health policy in view of the fact that families will be forced from 2019 onwards to take out compulsory health insurance? The idea should have been to attract more people in to sustain the private health insurance market during the move to universal health insurance. The opposite has been the case with the decision to cap tax relief on ordinary families.

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