Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It is interesting to talk about cuts when the HSE and the health service has received the largest ever health budget in the history of any budget in this House. It is simply not the case that we are cutting services. We are, however, expecting the hospitals to do a better job of collecting the income that this House legislated for them to collect. These are the views of the Comptroller and Auditor General in four reports in recent years. His office has acknowledged that there is scope to do more. The HSE sets the target for what it expects each hospital group and each individual hospital to collect in income. I have outlined the various different ways a hospital can do that through maintenance charges, long stay charges, car parking, retail, inpatient prescription charge income, canteen receipts and restaurants. These are the targets the HSE works out with the hospital group CEOs which should be met. This year, there was a target of €50 million and €44 million has been met. This shortfall was addressed in the context of the additional €0.5 billion I received for the health service.

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