Liam Twomey (Fine Gael)

Significant cutbacks were made to social welfare payments. Members of the House who are not bleeding heart liberals understand what has happened but it is clear the Government is far too arrogant to understand what I am talking about.

The Minister of State, Deputy Hoctor, describes her office as being responsible for a comprehensive policy vision to bring cohesion to Government planning, policy and service delivery. Was she consulted beforehand on the proposals to strip free health care from people over 70? It is unlikely. Was she informed when a civil servant sent a memo from the Department of Finance stating that the removal of the automatic entitlement to medical cards for those over 70 was a bad idea? We would appreciate an answer to that.

What kind of vision did the Minister of State have for the elderly as she applauded those proposals when they were announced on budget day? That is the betrayal elderly people got so worked up about outside this House soon after the budget was announced. They saw in the initial scheme that was announced an automatic entitlement to free general practitioner care and primary health care being replaced with vouchers. The reason the Government made a significant U-turn on that is because the people showed how much they disagreed with the proposals. The Government's vision for the elderly is in tatters because of the betrayal that was proposed by Government at that time.

There are differences between Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. I am pleased to inform Senator O'Malley that I have always been fully supportive of having free health care for everyone over 70. She was in the Lower House with me and Senator Feeney was on the Joint Committee on Health and Children with me when I informed the Minister on numerous occasions that having two payments for people over the age of 70 was a discriminatory practice. The Minister, Deputy Harney, did nothing about it and very little support was given to me in those five years in the Lower House whenever I raised that issue. It is disgraceful for them to take the high moral ground now. It is playing politics.

The Minister stated only 20,000 people over the age of 70 are affected. They are retired teachers, nurses, gardaí and civil servants. There are not that many retired judges and Ministers in the country for Government representatives to be so pathetic in their contributions by saying that they are the ones off whom the Government is taking medical cards. That is not true.