Dáil debates
Wednesday, 9 April 2008
Leaders' Questions
10:30 am
Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I was struck by a statement of the late Martin Luther King Jr., who was buried on this date. He said: "Our lives begin to end once we become silent about things that matter". The Taoiseach will be reflecting on his years as Taoiseach and head of the country in the next period and he must look back on how we as a nation have treated our elderly. A number of years ago Deputy O'Dowd exposed a number of scandals in the area of care of the elderly.
I took the opportunity to visit a hospital not far from here. I looked out the window and saw the skyline crowded with high-tower cranes and new buildings in close proximity. This is a hospital in Leopardstown, with four wards in an old house with added extensions. The wards are called after local townlands: Tibradden, Enniskerry, Kilternan and Kilgobbin. Each of these wards has 21 beds, 13 inches apart, which is less than the width of an A4 page. There is neither privacy, dignity nor respect. The medical staff and carers look after these people to the best of their ability. At 8.30 a.m. every day, when one talks of the Celtic tiger and the huge amounts of money generated in this country over the past 20 years, reality dawns in this institution more than in any other.
There are ten to 15 commodes operating in each ward, where there is neither respect, dignity nor integrity. It has been stripped away by the physical limitations of the building. The management board has spoken to the HSE for a number of years but nothing has happened. They have not got beyond the starting blocks. The hospital is located in an area where land is worth multi-million euro sums per acre. This is not the symbol of the Celtic tiger that the Taoiseach wishes to leave behind when he moves on. This is not the way our elderly people should be treated. This is not what they should have at the end of their days: cramped space, curtains at the end of the bed and neither respect, dignity nor integrity.
I know the Taoiseach is a caring person. I have not made many personal requests to the Taoiseach but I make this one. In his remaining tenure as Taoiseach, will he visit Leopardstown hospital, meet the management and staff and meet the patients who bear their indignity with great fortitude? I was shocked to see the proximity of bed to bed. It is not the symbol of the Celtic tiger or of Ireland that the Taoiseach wishes to leave behind. I ask him to visit and return to the House to tell us what he can do about this.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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I thank Deputy Kenny for raising the matter of the particular hospital. In my tenure as Taoiseach I have been in hospitals, homes and community homes up and down the country. I have seen the enormous improvements and successes but also the enormous challenges. I have seen some of the community hospitals that, by their location or the age of the clientele, have pressing needs. I have also seen enormous increases in staffing ratios, medical and paramedical cover, ancillary facilities, improvements in life expectancy and the physical improvements in the buildings. I will not say that of every last hospital, institution and home, many of which date back to the foundation times. The hospital at Leopardstown is one of them. Most of the hospitals in this city were built from 1860-90 and had their foundation in religious orders. Most have physical challenges in their structures. I note what Deputy Kenny has said referred to physical structure. He is acknowledging that the staffing and loving care and attention level people need in older age is very adequate and that the infrastructure problem is the issue. I will get an update on that.
Specifically on elderly care, the Governments I have been honoured to lead have substantially increased resources for care for the elderly and the capital programme of the health service every year. We must understand that life expectancy has dramatically increased in this country, a fact we should all be proud of, including our health professionals, policy makers and politicians. Because of this, the number of people requiring inpatient and community care is rising dramatically and will continue to rise. The figures for the next 20 years are already known and this is not in doubt. This will take a greater part of the capital budget and resources. A large number of the 30,000 extra people who have been recruited into the health service have gone into care of the elderly. It is good that we can resource that, but it is a challenge. The Deputy asked me about a request and I would be glad to get an update on it.
Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I hope the Taoiseach takes the opportunity to go out there.
In respect of the elderly in general, every Deputy has serious problems with the HSE. Deputy Naughten received two letters from the HSE in the last period, one of which told him that two weeks of respite care in a nursing home had been withdrawn because there were adequate home help allowances and home care packages whereas the other, which he received from the other wing of the HSE, told him that the allowances and packages were no longer available because of a shortage of money.
If one goes to the hospital in Leopardstown at 8.30 a.m., one will find cramped and confined conditions and staff who are doing the best they can. Of the commodes in operation, there are four toilets, two washbasins and two showers for every 20 people if they are ambulant. It is concerning that, if anything occurs in the hospital at night when there are only two night nurses on duty, there will be a catastrophe. It is physically impossible to remove people in time were something to go wrong. The HSE has never inspected the premises and there has been no health and safety or fire check. When staff have met HSE officials to discuss the physical building — there is plenty of land on which to build — they have never got past the starting blocks.
Why does it take so long for action to be taken after the Government has decided on something? The Government has introduced legislation after 11 years, but there are still no regulations for the hospitals and homes in situ. How long does it take for there to be action? The cranes along the skyline that those being cared for will look at this morning will still be there when the people are being carried out of the hospital. The situation, cramped and physically intimidating conditions and the stripping away of dignity, respect and integrity, should concern every Member of the House. I would like to believe that, when the Government makes a decision, it is carried through effectively. I would like to believe that the HSE's officials will listen to these words and see to it that a catastrophe does not occur in the four wards in question, that the institution receives the attention it deserves and that the elderly, as a microcosm of many other situations around the country, are given some sense of dignity and respect in their remaining days on this earth.
Noel CoonanBertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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As I said, the hospital in Leopardstown is a particular hospital. I think that Deputy Kenny knows we have 53 acute hospitals across the country and very few of those have not had major capital refurbishments and an injection of capital in recent years. Leopardstown has its own development plans. Recently, it has had its own campaign in inviting Deputies from all sides of the House to look at those plans and to see what can be done to improve them. What we have done and what we must continue to do relates to a large part of the increase. We have increased the health budget from €4 billion to €16 billion. It is not the billions that count, it is the staff numbers, and there has been a huge increase in staff numbers to give that care.
Pádraic McCormack (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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Why are beds empty in St. Francis Private Hospital in Galway and St. Anne's Home in Clifden?
Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Deputy Johnny Brady should go easy. We are watching him.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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There has been an increase of almost 45,000 staff in recent years in the health service.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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In a short number of years, there has been an increase of 30,000 staff and many of those people have gone into dedicated sectors.
As to why it takes so long, as Deputy Kenny knows, a lot of the difficulties lie in the fact that it takes a long time from an approval being given by the Department of Health and Children or the HSE and the appointment of a design team to going through the stages of development and undertaking construction. There are procedures in our public capital programme that we have tightened down in recent years because people were always concerned about what abuse might exist. One of the reasons we wanted to move on the issue of campus beds, to get more beds in and make more space, was for that reason, because it would greatly speed up matters.
Pádraic McCormack (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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The Government should use the ones it has.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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The reality is that any major development from start to finish takes seven or eight years. That is the lifespan involved. There is also incessant demand. Even when one improves the facilities to cater for the numbers that one wants, people come back and look for far more additional staff to do the same work in a new building. That has its own difficulties and delays. It has delayed and continues to delay a number of projects. I have raised with the trade unions and others the matter of avoiding those problems. There is also the cost that accrues over a long period.
In all our acute hospitals there is a huge capital budget today as compared to five years ago and that budget is improving wards, outpatient facilities and accident and emergency units.
Pádraic McCormack (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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It is closing wards.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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In practically every part of the country we are seeing new facilities. Leopardstown has its own development plan and is going through its own phases with the HSE and the Department of Health and Children to try to get its plan. I will get an update on how that stands.
From the Government's point of view, in this year's capital programme, even in tougher times, we are pushing ahead with the staff numbers and staff approvals in the areas that require them and we will continue to do that.
Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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I want to raise with the Taoiseach a tax scam that was first raised by my colleague, Deputy Burton, and that cost the Exchequer approximately €250 million in 2006. This is the tax scam whereby developers purchasing development land can get away with paying no stamp duty. As I understand it, the developer pays the money to the land owner who enters into a licence agreement with the developer to allow the latter to develop the land and grants power of attorney to the developer. The sale is not formally completed to the point where title is formally transferred. Therefore, it is not stamped and stamp duty is not payable.
Deputy Burton spotted this loophole in our tax code first and drew the Minister for Finance's attention to it. The Revenue Commissioners recommended that the loophole be closed and the Minister for Finance introduced legislation in 2007 to close it. However, it appears that the boys in the Galway tent got to work as the relevant section of the Act was never commenced. It is estimated that the amount lost to the Exchequer in 2006 was €250 million, a great deal of money for a Government that the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Dermot Ahern, tells the House does not have a red cent to build a hospital.
Will the Taoiseach explain to home buyers who needed to pay stamp duty for the purchase of their homes — some paid stamp duty for homes that are now worth much less than the purchase prices — or to those who are still paying stamp duty due to trading up and so on why people buying family homes have been required to pay stamp duty whereas big developers buying land for development purposes can get away without paying stamp duty and why that provision of the Finance Act 2007 has not been commenced?
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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This matter has been around for some time. It is not true to say that it has only been raised in the past year or two.
Buyers of development land can reduce stamp duty liability through mechanisms such as licensing, resting on contract and long-term lease arrangements. Under these mechanisms, land is purchased for development without conveyancing, transfer of legal title or submission of stamping by Revenue. It thereby avoids, rather than evades, stamp duty liability. A number of anti-avoidance measures were included in the Finance Bill last year to enable the Minister to deal with such practices whenever it was deemed appropriate to so do, having regard to the state of the housing sector and market conditions. This is the reason the provisions were subject to the introduction of a commencement order, as are many of these areas.
Goodbody Economic Consultants was commissioned to examine independently the economic and market consequences of commencing the provisions, while taking into account the changes that occurred in the housing market from the time the Finance Act 2007 became law at this time last year. In line with prior commitments, the report was published by the Department in either late December 2007 or January 2008. Its main points were that the commencement of such anti-avoidance provisions might increase the cost of land by approximately 10%, which would result in a decline in transactions and would increase house prices; and that the impact of the section, which is known by the industry and to the tax authorities as section 110, would result in driving activity levels far below long-term housing requirements, thereby contributing to a spiral of increasing prices for first-time buyers as fewer units would be built. The report recommended not commencing section 110 because it risks "exacerbating the down turn in the property market", which would have a negative impact on employment and tax revenues.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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There are arrangements for maintaining the current arrangements in the long term, because of the negative impact of the provision on the availability of development land and the supply of housing. The Government must weigh up the balance between the benefits of the tax revenues that would arise from the introduction of this section and the potential loss to the Exchequer——
Joe Costello (Dublin Central, Labour)
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The Government will retain the scam.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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——of the reduction of activity in the building sector and its impact on society and the economy.
Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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The Government will take the hit, lest the lads become nervous.
Emmet Stagg (Kildare North, Labour)
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It is a scam. Will the Government think up a few more scams?
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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As the Deputies in the Labour Party may recall, yesterday I referred to the first quarter. Deputy Gilmore asked me about the income figures for the first quarter and I replied the issue did not pertain to the taxes from employment, which have increased by 5%, but to the area of capital gains. This is because there is insufficient purchasing and development going on.
Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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Despite the breaks, they still are not working.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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The difficulty lies in stimulating the industry. One cannot worry about construction employment on Tuesday and then try on Wednesday to trigger something that will affect construction employment.
Emmet Stagg (Kildare North, Labour)
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The Taoiseach should get out of it. He is trying to suggest the scam is a good thing.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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Consistency in this regard might at least last for 24 hours. It was recommended that the provisions should not be commenced at this time——
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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——and this recommendation has been accepted by the Government.
Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Labour)
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This typifies everything that is wrong with the Government.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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It must be emphasised that the matter is being kept under review to take into account changes in the property market.
Ciarán Lynch (Cork South Central, Labour)
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The Government will ensure it continues.
Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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Perhaps my understanding of basic economics is less than that of the Taoiseach, but I do not understand the reason the Taoiseach can retain stamp duty, albeit at a changed rate, on the purchase of houses. He states that will not affect the property market, but a developer buying development land who has to pay stamp duty on land he or she might not develop for many years to come somehow will have a catastrophic effect on the market. Given the amount of hoarding that has taken place of development land, particularly in Dublin, Members are aware of the length of time that elapses between the purchase and development of land. This is rubbish.
Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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The Taoiseach is providing a shelter for people who are buying. This pertains to the major developers; big high-rolling development land purchases are what is being protected. To tell Members this practice has been around for some time makes it worse. It means it has been around since the time when serious money was being made from those who tried to make a home for themselves by purchasing their first homes in the face of the amount of profiteering that took place in the property market. This does not offer any comfort.
The Taoiseach has reminded Members of yesterday's exchanges. I asked him yesterday about the statement made last week by the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy John Gormley, who is absent, to the effect the Government intended to introduce a new windfall tax on land and the sale of land. How does the Taoiseach expect Members to believe that the Government will introduce a new windfall tax on development land when it will not even implement the taxes that are already on the Statute Book? This does not make sense.
Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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It is a windfall all right.
Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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This is a gift to people who are making big money on the exchange of development land and who have made massive profits on it.
Pádraic McCormack (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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They should give some of it back.
Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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The Taoiseach is giving them something back at a time when Government finances are tightening. The Government is failing to implement a measure that is on the Statute Book. As for the report from Goodbody Economic Consultants, it was nothing more than a survey of developers.
Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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They were the only ones consulted.
Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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What else would they have told Goodbody Economic Consultants, other than they did not wish to see the measure implemented?
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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Members should examine what is an independent report carried out on the basis of the entire industry and the situation as a whole.
Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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It was a survey of the developers.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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It is not by any means a survey of developers.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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I will make a number of points. As I noted previously, it is incorrect that nothing has been done on this matter. The survey points out the full detail in this regard and there is no need for me to go into it. However, the Finance Act introduced these provisions and the Government stated it would consider the matter. My point to Deputy Gilmore is that since 1999, the Government has been attempting to stabilise the housing market. This week, the Central Bank for the first time stated that this had been achieved. The Government is trying to keep employment in construction as strong as possible. It is trying to ensure that at a time when there are affordability issues, it is at least getting on top of that for first-time buyers.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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I refer to what has happened in the market, in respect of stamp duty and the actions of the Tánaiste and Minister for Finance regarding mortgage relief. We are giving them a break.
While it is possible to introduce this measure, there would be a corresponding and immediate large increase in the price of a house. What is the point in achieving that?
Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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The Opposition would have increased the prices.
Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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If this measure is not introduced, will they bring down the prices?
11:00 am
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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As for the figures used in the various assumptions that are being put forward, a point that has been lost is that they are based on the premise that all developers have put in place arrangements so that no stamp duty liability could have arisen in respect of any conveyancing. This pertains to the projected figures that I have read in articles recently. However, this does not represent reality because developers take conveyances on property for various reasons. As the report points out, these reasons include security where a property may be in the process of being assembled to ensure long-term certainty or a requirement from financial institutions prior to advancing funding. In reality, the tax at issue is taken to be a small percentage of this. Were Members to examine the report, they would learn there is no sum of €200 million or €400 million being lost in this regard.
Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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The Revenue Commissioners——
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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Stamp duty statistics are taken from instruments presented to the Revenue Commissioners from stamping. This is where it applies and if there is no obligation to present documents for stamping, there is no way to estimate accurately the amount of duty that could have been collected, had the provisions been changed.
Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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The Taoiseach is defending a loophole. He should abolish it.
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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The Goodbody report points out there are no official data sources on the value of development land sales. Therefore, it gives an indicative estimate of the total value of development land in 2006 of between €7 billion and €8 billion. It goes on to point out how one can calculate the figures in a realistic manner, in so far as is possible. It is nothing like the projected figures.
As I stated at the outset, the provision is on the Statute Book. When the situation in respect of the property and housing markets will enable the Government to implement it, I am sure it will so do. To do so now would——
Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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Why not apply principles?
Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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——be negative for the market, employment and first-time buyers. An independent analysis has vindicated that position.