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

In Ireland, we provide our health and social care through a number of different mechanisms. Sometimes it is provided directly by the State through the HSE while at other times, it is provided through a section 38 body, which is a voluntary body. St. Vincent's University Hospital, which is not too far from here, would be an obvious example where the staff are considered to be public servants but the body itself is not part of the public service. Sometimes this care is provided through section 39 bodies, some of whom have been mentioned by the Deputy. In these cases, the body receives some of its funding from the State and often receives some of it from other sources. The people employed in these organisations are not public servants. Sometimes care is provided through private contracts. For example, most of our GP and dental services are provided by GPs and dentists who are self-employed and have staff who are not on public service contracts and are not part of the public service pay bill. That is how we structure our health and social care services in Ireland. We provide those services in lots of different ways - sometimes directly by the State through State employees, sometimes through private contractors like GPs and dentists who have their own employees, sometimes through section 38 bodies, and sometimes through section 39 bodies. For better or for worse, that is the way it has grown up since the foundation of the State.

There was a dispute about pay in section 39 bodies that went to the Workplace Relations Commission. We have an agreement and I would expect the employers and the unions to honour that agreement. I am sure they will. I do not have the exact figures relating to funding in front of me. I will dig them out. Funding for section 39 bodies has increased for each of the past three years. Funding for these bodies has increased at a higher rate than has funding for the HSE and its own services. While HSE services got a certain increase, the section 39 bodies got a larger increase than the HSE, so the assessment offered by the Deputy does not really add up. If the HSE bodies are getting less of an increase than the section 39 bodies, the section 39 bodies should be well able to afford any additional spending the HSE bodies are providing.

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