Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move:

“That Dáil Éireann:

notes:

— the inappropriate and burdensome full financial audit of the entire household and all its expenses as the sole route for a seriously ill child or a child with a disability to apply for a medical card;

— the onerous application process, the exclusive focus on 'financial hardship' and the failure to take account of medical need and the impact of a serious medical condition on a child and their family in the application for a medical card that currently exists;

— that the report of the Expert Panel on Medical Need for Medical Card Eligibility - the Keane report - concluded that it would be neither possible nor ethical to produce a list of medical conditions on which to base automatic entitlement to a medical card and that 'a listing approach risks inequity by diagnosis and a further fragmentation of services';

— that the Keane report recommended that the development of a more compassionate medical card system, which accommodates those with significant illness and disability, should be used as a 'stepping stone' to the implementation of the first phase of free GP care for all; and

— the Department of Social Protection's domiciliary care allowance scheme provides an example of an assessment model on which a new medical card eligibility test could be based, in that it is independent of both financial means and diagnosis titles; rather, eligibility is based on reaching a threshold of care needs;

acknowledges that:

— several campaigns, including the Our Children's Health campaign, were launched by families impacted by illness and disability who have first-hand experience of the struggle to secure and retain medical cards for their children; and

— the programme for Government states 'we will extend the entitlement to a medical card for all children in receipt of the Domiciliary Care Allowance in Budget 2017. Approximately 10,000 children would benefit from this initiative'; and

resolves to immediately extend a full medical card to every child qualifying for the domiciliary care allowance."

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