Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On the replies, it was alleged that I was playing with the figures. The only figures I used are those that applied to the period of government between 2011 and now, 2016. I cannot account for what happened during the period 2008 to 2011 but Deputy Boyd Barrett is correct to say that in that period the mental health budget was cut back very severely. The number of staff was cut very severely in that period also. We are still recovering from that. I am disappointed that none of the Members from the Fianna Fáil Party opposite acknowledged that at all.

The Deputy also referred to some specific local services in his constituency. I do not have any information on those but if he would like to contact the CHO I am sure he can be given a reply. While the budget is increasing, that does not mean that the budget for everything increases. Of course, the HSE, from national director level down to CHO level, has to make decisions within its budget as to how that should best be deployed locally.

Deputy Troy made a valuable contribution to the debate in pointing out that he thought that water charges were getting too much attention. I could not agree with him more. Water charges are getting too much attention but again the Deputy needs to look to his party about that. I had expected that in the negotiations to form a Government, Fianna Fáil might have come with extensive demands on health care, might have said that the price of being in power would be an Irish national health service with universal health care and that the new Government would have to find the billions of euro to make that happen but-----

See this speech in context