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

The Minister has forgotten that the people who pay private health insurance are subsidising the public health system. It is very much a merry-go-round because many families are making extraordinary efforts to maintain private health insurance and removing the responsibility from the State to provide health care for them. In effect, they are subsidising the public health system by taking out private health insurance. Coupled with this, the Government has decided to charge full cost for private patients in public beds. There is cross-subsidisation. We do not want the State to subsidise gold-plated health insurance policies, but the definition of gold-plated means that ordinary health policies without bells and whistles are being directly affected. The cost increases are exerting major pressure on families, more of whom are dropping out of the private health insurance market. This is undermining the market. I am referring not to the policies with bells and whistles but to ordinary health insurance policies.

See this speech in context