Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Naughten for bringing forward this amendment. I will not be able to support it at this Stage but I will explain what action I intend to take following on from his request.

First, it is Government policy and the policy of the Oireachtas to drive more patient traffic through the smaller hospitals. It makes sense to fully utilise our hospitals. I visited Roscommon hospital with Deputy Naughten, where we worked together to make that hospital busier in recent years and that is and must be the direction of travel.

While it is fair to say that there are significant capacity pressures in the Irish public health service, it is not entirely fair when others suggest that there is no capacity because there is underutilised capacity in some of our smaller hospitals. My colleague and friend, the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, brought me to Monaghan Hospital, where there is a capacity to do more. We are using the National Treatment Purchase Fund, NTPF, as a vehicle to drive more procedures through the smaller hospitals, such as, for example, the cataract theatre in Nenagh. The NTPF should no longer be merely a vehicle for outsourcing to private hospitals but we should be using it as an access tool to make our smaller hospitals busier. That is Government policy.

Second, Deputy Naughten made a fair and timely point on urgent care centres and minor injury clinics. The Deputy suggests the fee for them should be lower than the fee for attending an emergency department. I agree with the Deputy. I was intending to make this announcement tomorrow but I will make it this evening. I will be signing a statutory instrument within the next week to reduce the fee to attend a minor injuries unit from €100 to €75, making it a little more costly than going to the GP if one does not have a medical card but lower than going to the emergency department, ED. I hope that will particularly help during the winter pressure period. I very much accept the Deputy's counsel in that regard. That is probably the quickest resolution the Deputy has ever got to an issue.

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