James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

As they say, one can avoid the facts but they will not avoid you. Deputy Kelleher alludes to 2008. Would he tell us what the Supplementary Estimate was in 2009? Would he like to tell us what it was in 2010? In his party's last year in government, it was nearly €600 million in health. Let us deal with the facts. In 14 of the past 17 years there have been Supplementary Estimates in health. For 12 of those 14 years, the budget was increasing, and was quadrupled, and still they failed to keep it within budget.

At a time when we have had to take €3.3 billion out because of the mess the Government of which his party was a member left this country in, we have had to take serious decisions about how the health service is run. The good men and women who work in the health service have managed to achieve a reduction in the number of patients who have to lie on trolleys for long periods of time and a reduction in the number of patients who have to wait long periods for inpatient treatment and, for the first time ever, and have quantified the number of outpatients and treated 95% of them within a year. The health service is improving, despite the serious challenges that it has to face.

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