Sean Barrett (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister for Health's welcome for the McCarthy report on health insurance which was published yesterday. The current health insurance system is not sustainable, as both gentlemen said. It is losing members, contrary to the Government's objective to have a universal health insurance system in operation in a few years. The current system is protectionist and is not cost conscious. The Minister said to Pat Kenny last night that people should check the bills to ascertain if they received all the items on them. That is difficult for sick people to do. We need competing companies but they cannot survive under the current rules, which are designed to benefit the VHI company, as has been pointed out by the European Court and the Supreme Court. In the current edition of Time magazine the professor of global health in Harvard says: "In Rwanda, for example, just ten years ago there was no community-based health insurance scheme. Now almost 95% of Rwandans are involved in at least some kind of health insurance." We might ask the Minister of State with responsibility for overseas aid, Deputy Joe Costello, to report on how that was done in Rwanda when it is proving impossible here. Will the Leader impress upon the Minister for Health, Deputy James Reilly, the need to redouble his efforts to make affordable universal health insurance available in this country, in light of recent research, including the ESRI report yesterday, which shows that the bulk of the burden of the recession has been borne by people under 45 years of age?

Last Thursday, the Supreme Court overturned section 3 of the Industrial Relations Act as contrary to Article 15.2.1 of the Constitution. The important part of this is that it was the usurpation of the functions of the Oireachtas by an administrative body. There has been a number of those with regard to health insurance and taxis. Can the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Brendan Howlin, who has responsibility for reform in this area, be invited to address the House on the need to strengthen Parliament against the undermining of Parliament by the administrative arm? One thing we must do in our reform programme, to which we are deeply committed, is address the institutions, practices and people which put the country on the rocks in 2008. Undermining the Parliament by administrative action is unacceptable. I hope the Minister, Deputy Howlin, will address us on preventing recurrences of that nature. Making law in the Supreme Court is extremely expensive - that case took over ten years to get there - so let us do it here instead.