Thomas Pringle (Donegal South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am glad to have the opportunity to contribute to the debate tonight. The statement in the motion to the effect that health services are underfunded is probably the greatest understatement that has been made in the House in a long time. We could spend hours going through where the funding difficulties and problems in the health services are, but my focus in the time allotted to me is on the crisis in care for older people, particularly with regard to the fair deal scheme. The budget for next year provides for an increase of €10 million in the fair deal scheme, which will be nowhere near adequate. Community nursing homes are in crisis because they cannot access enough funding under fair deal to meet their running costs. I think in particular of Áras Ghaoth Dobhair in County Donegal which depends on the fair deal scheme. On foot of the pricing arrangement worked out under the scheme, that community run and led facility cannot even meet its running costs.

As the number of over-65s will double in the next ten years, there is a massive crisis on our doorstep. We need to see the roll out of a building programme to provide public beds. We must double the number of beds in the system. I wonder if the Department really wants to include the €25 million to come from stopping bed blocking within the HSE. If one moves an elderly person out of an acute hospital into a nursing home under the fair deal scheme, it does not save the HSE any money, it increases the costs of the fair deal bed. Right away, the bed in the acute hospital will be filled with another patient. Being efficient and moving people out of blocked beds will actually increase the cost pressures within the service. I wonder what the motivation is and whether it is to deal with people who are holding up beds in acute hospitals and getting them out into nursing homes and community care. That is really where the issue is.

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