Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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1. To ask the Minister for Health when he expects to receive the 2014 Health Service Executive service plan; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [48345/13]

Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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The purpose of the question is to find out exactly not only when the service plan will be published but the detail it will contain. There is even an acceptance across the floor that the figures announced in the Budget Statement are not sustainable. A fanciful budget was again presented to the House in terms of the proposed €666 million in cuts. The Minister stated at the Oireachtas committee hearings that he felt they would be hard to achieve. We have a farcical situation where a budget was presented to the Parliament and the Minister is retrospectively verifying the figures. He refers to having the facts and figures available to him on a monthly basis while at the same time we find he has washed its hands of the budget in the context of the Estimates for 2014, which were presented to the House on 15 October. Will the Minister explain what will be in the service plan and whether the detail will be sustainable?

James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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Under the 2004 Health Act, the Health Service Executive, HSE, has 21 days from the publication of the Estimates for supply services on budget day to submit its 2014 national service plan for my consideration. This would have required the HSE to finalise and submit its service plan for next year by Tuesday, 5 November. The Act, however, allows the Minister for Health to provide the HSE with any such other period that he or she may wish to allow in this regard. In view of the challenging budgetary context, which my colleague has highlighted in florid terms, within which the 2014 plan must be prepared, I wrote to the HSE on Wednesday, 30 October to confirm that the executive would be given an additional ten days, that is, until Friday, 15 November, to adopt and submit its 2014 service plan for my consideration. This extended period also recognises that the earlier than usual presentation of the 2014 budget and the demanding Estimates ceiling for health spending in 2014 makes the task of preparing the 2014 plan particularly challenging and difficult for the executive.

Given the earliness of the budget, this gives more time to make sure hospitals and other services have their budgets in place on 1 January even if time is taken up doing so at this point. Clearly, a huge challenge must be met, to which the Deputy has alluded. It is premature to say it will be impossible before it is delivered.

Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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There is a great deal of hand washing going on. The HSE is obligated under the Act to provide a service plan but at the same time officials from the Departments of the Taoiseach and Public Expenditure and Reform are trying to verify the figures while the HSE is expected to draft a plan to provide services in 2014. The Minister stated that he feels these figures are almost unachievable and it was reported that the distaste officials had for the probity drive relating to medical cards published by the Department of Public Expenditure as a way of slashing costs was almost palpable. The Minister of State. Deputy Alex White rowed in behind the Minister some time later when he appeared before the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Health stating, "They look like very large figures. They look big to me, I will be honest with you". They look big to all of us. The difficulty is the HSE is trying to draft a service plan but we do not know whether the cuts that will make up the overall savings of €666 million or, for example, the €130 million saving in the probity drive for medical cards will be achievable.

James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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I will initially respond to the Deputy's use of the phrase "hand washing". Nobody on these benches has washed his or her hands of anything. However, people who sit on the benches around the Deputy and particularly in the seat beside him are good at wringing and washing their hands about issues and they have a great degree of amnesia when it comes to their role in the formation of the HSE and all that went with it. It is extraordinary that at a time of unprecedented access to money that the health service went from bad to worse culminating in 569 people on trolleys in January 2011.

The Deputy quoted me as saying the figures were unachievable. I never used that word. I said I was deeply concerned about the challenge they represented and I remain concerned. A validation process is ongoing in this regard.

Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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We could talk about amnesia a lot. The Minister has experienced a fair amount of it in the context of the commitments made prior to the election and even when he took up office. We will not go down that road.

A total of €666 million was identified a number of weeks ago in the health Estimate for 2014. The HSE is charged with drawing up a service plan for 2014 but nobody can tell me the Minister will save €130 million through medical card probity. He cannot say that will certainly happen. How in the name of God is the HSE meant to draft a service plan to provide for all the commitments being made in the House on a daily basis when the amount it will have to spend is unknown? It is not credible or tenable for a Minister to ask for a service plan in that environment.

James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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It is incredible that the Deputy is referring to the unknown. We do not have the service plan. How can he comment on what is achievable or not achievable?

Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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The Minister said the figure was not achievable.

James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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I told the Deputy I did not use the word "unachievable" but he likes to twist things to suit his own end. The bottom line is he is arguing about something he or I have not seen.

The Deputy is telling me what is not possible before he has seen the plan to deal with it. I humbly suggest to him that he would be better waiting until the service plan comes out before he makes any further comments on it.