Paschal Mooney (Fianna Fail)

Over the weekend, the Seanad and its future were to the fore once again in media reports. A number of Members have been in the media, most recently the distinguished Leader. From my experience on the other side of the House, I appreciate the difficulty the Leader has, and will continue to have, in attempting to encourage Ministers to come to the House and to provide us with meaningful legislation.

However, I raise a voice of concern from this side of the House that over the past number of weeks, in particular since the resumption, while the Leader quite correctly and legitimately pointed out that the House is sitting for an increased number of days, it is more about quality rather than quantity. I am sure he shares our concern that the House increasingly seems to have a lack of meaningful legislation brought before it and he will take steps to try to address it in the interests of parliamentary democracy rather than in the self-interest of the future of this House.

Health has been in the news over the past number of days. Quinn Healthcare has announced another savage increase in subscription fees. On average, it seems there is almost a 20% increase across-the-board for all health insurance companies and in excess of 100,000 people are now leaving the health insurance scheme. This will create enormous difficulties if the haemorrhage continues. I hope the Leader will convey the real concern about the impact this will have on our already stretched public health service. In that context, I ask the Leader if he will provide time for a debate.

It might also be practical to convey to the Minister for Health, who is coming to the House in February, that there should be a debate or some response to the report on the delivery of pharmaceuticals in Ireland by the ESRI. The report was commissioned by the HSE and shows that pharmaceutical costs have risen dramatically over the past number of years. Some 17%, equating to €1.9 billion, of the total health budget is now spent on drugs. The basis of the report concerned three key areas of the high factory gate price of drugs in Ireland for patent and generic drugs, more information and doctors' prescriptions being altered at pharmacies. A doctor will inevitably provide a prescription for patented drugs and the pharmacist must respond to the drug on the prescription and cannot alter it despite the fact that the pharmacists may have a generic drug in stock costing half the price of the patented drug. This is a serious issue at a time when it is coming under increasing financial strain. The ESRI reports that if its recommendations are taken on board, there could be a saving of 25% or €500 million. I ask the Leader to convey to the Minister for Health that he should take account of this report before coming to the House to discuss the new service plan. If the Leader had time between now and February, the House could have a debate on the implications of the report, which has far-reaching consequences if its recommendations are not acted on.