Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House and thank him for bringing forward this legislation, which I welcome. We have been dealing with this issue through statutory regulations since 1994. There have been a number of regulations and pieces of legislation dealing with this issue. This is about formalising what now needs to put in place to deal with the matter into the future. It is important to remove any discrimination between younger and older people and between healthy and unhealthy people. The Bill does this in respect of health insurance and ensures there can be no discrimination because of age, sex or health status.

The Bill broadens the scope for sharing the costs of health insurance not only in respect of age but between the healthy and unhealthy. It also prevents insurers from engaging in market segmentation. This involves going after the area where there is less risk of claim. The Minister referred earlier to the proposal on universal health insurance. It is important for us to put the proper plans in place before that is fully introduced. This Bill is one of a number of further steps in this area. It is important that there is careful planning in respect of universal health care by the Department and the entire health care sector from those in general practice to public and private hospitals and their staff.

The delay in hospitals recovering monies from health insurers is an important issue. A complaint raised recently with me related to people admitted to hospital who, while under the overall supervision of a consultant, would not have been seen by him or her because the required procedure was minor and dealt with by a senior or specialist registrar. The problem is that the claim being sent to the insurance company cannot be submitted by the hospital unless it is signed by the consultant even though he or she may never have seen the patient. Could this issue be looked at? Why is there a requirement for the consultant to sign a health claim form when he or she has not seen the patient? It is not that the consultant is avoiding seeing the patient, rather it is that the patient was adequately looked after by the senior or specialist registrar.

My complaint is that consultants are now being required to complete a huge amount of documentation unnecessarily and it is consuming a huge amount of time. The reason I raise this is with regard to the legislation that is planned regarding charging for public beds occupied by private patients. In that case will the consultants also have to sign the forms before the claims go forward? Can a procedure be put in place whereby the paperwork can be dealt with administratively, because much of it is administrative rather than medical? This issue is causing a great deal of concern, especially in smaller units across the country. In the bigger units, if people are on a one-in-five roster or a one-in-six roster, they have more time to deal with administrative issues, but if they are on a one-in-two roster, which is still in place in certain areas of medicine, or a one-in-three roster, they do not have the same amount of time to deal with what is purely administrative work. Perhaps that could be examined, because this issue will arise with the introduction of legislation providing for charges for private patients in public beds.

The Minister gave a comprehensive overview of each section of the legislation in his presentation today. This is important legislation. The deadline for the old procedure expires on 31 December next, so it is important that this legislation is passed and is in place for 1 January 2013 so proper procedures are followed by the health insurance providers and to ensure there is a balanced approach in the charges imposed on people who spend money on private health insurance. An issue we must examine in the long term is how we can ensure that the number who opt out of taking out health insurance is reduced. We must ensure that people continue, if possible, to remain in private health care. That is necessary to make sure there is adequate funding available from the point of view of both the insurance companies and also the health care providers. That is extremely important.

I welcome the Bill and I look forward to working with the Minister on the other planned legislation that is due to be introduced in 2013.