Results 12,881-12,900 of 49,836 for speaker:Stephen Donnelly
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: It is good news. There is now a very small percentage waiting to be paid. It is the nature of these things that we do not tend to hear from the many who have been paid; we tend to hear from those who have not been paid because, quite rightly, there is a small number and they deserve to be paid. It is very good news. Some €208 million has been distributed. That is a huge amount...
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: The Dublin Fire Brigade was allocated €1.265 million. Dublin City Council was allocated €840,000. The note I have is that the payment of these staff is a matter for the bodies involved but it is understood to be substantially complete.
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: No, it is small at this stage.
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: There certainly is. To be honest, I encountered it myself. I think it was University Hospital Galway that I was in, where some of the contract cleaning staff and catering staff approached me and said they were told they were out of scope. I assured them that they are in scope. The payments got processed. In that sense, it did not roll out perfectly. What I will do is ask the Department...
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: Yes, I hear Deputy Durkan.
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: I hear you, a Chathaoirligh. I would just re-emphasise that people tend to contact us as elected representatives when things are not going right. The reality is that €208 million in tax-free payments-----
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: -----has been successfully sent out, quite rightly, in recognition. In terms of KOSI, the HSE has established a portal for employees who do not have an employer to claim on their behalf. There is also an appeals mechanism in place. Colleagues can contact me any time, and regularly do. I feed individual queries back to the Department regularly. Members should feel free to give the details...
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: My submission was fairly short. I do not have it to hand but the main point I believe I was making was to draw the reviewers' attention to the fact that notwithstanding the letter of intent having been written, several procedures and processes were still to be gone through before the allocation of any funding, in this case the allocation of the €2 million per year. It would have come...
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: The reason I said that was in answer to the Deputy's first question, in which he asked what was in my submission.
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: I was answering that first. On the Deputy's second point, the report is quite clear. It looked at the timelines and showed that the then Taoiseach's chief of staff found out about the detail of this very late in the day, after it had come to public light through the original announcement of the move and then the subsequent announcement of the secondment. I do not know, but I imagine that...
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: Can I respond briefly to that? I do not disagree with any of that. It is important that we are all open to feedback and to getting better at things. We have to be open to learning and we always have to strive to improve at everything we do. Having spent a lot of time on it, I believe that everyone involved was acting in good faith. I believe the proposed secondment - most of us here...
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: I will finish this if I may because I know it has been the topic of a lot of discussion. We must be open to learning lessons. My clear view is that everyone involved was acting in good faith and trying to do the right thing.
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: It is an important measure. The IMO, on behalf of GPs, came to me and the Department and raised - I have no doubt they came to members of this committee as well - genuine concerns about our plan.
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: I thank Deputy Cullinane. It will not surprise him that I do not accept that characterisation at all. To be clear, the ICGP would not normally be involved. It would be the IMO.
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: It is but it is the IMO that would be raising the concerns rather than the professional body. I was well aware of the concerns, as we all were, on budget day. The IMO and GPs have been raising capacity concerns. They had been raising concerns even about doing something much more modest, which was adding six- and seven-year-olds, which is approximately 70,000 children. We were well aware...
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: I appreciate that, but I am saying that I took a call and made a recommendation to the Government that we should move ahead anyway. That was the right thing to do. Six years after the Oireachtas agreed that this would be the approach is long enough to wait. I allocated a substantial amount of money into this year's Estimates to support GPs. I hope the committee does not mind, but there is...
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: The date set was 1 April. I fully accept that.
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: What I can tell Deputy Cullinane now is that I was with the IMO at the weekend. We will be in intensive discussions with the IMO in the coming weeks. I do not want to give a date, but I want this in place and agreed very shortly.
- Select Committee on Health: Estimates for Public Services 2023
Vote 38 - Health (Further Revised) (19 Apr 2023) Stephen Donnelly: I know. It is as much as I can answer at this point.