Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

First, I join Senator van Turnhout in welcoming the opening of the female genital mutilation, FGM, clinic in Ireland. Interestingly, an Irish person opened the first such clinic in the United Kingdom approximately 21 years ago. The reason it was opened was because a huge number of Somali woman came into United Kingdom and into London in particular and suddenly hospitals there had a new problem with which to deal. It was interesting to raise that issue with a senior politician at the time, 20-odd years ago, to be told this would never be a problem in Ireland. Senator van Turnhout has mentioned a figure of approximately 4,500 women who now require the facilities of this clinic, which just shows how one should never think that change will not come. New issues arise on a day-to-day basis and one should be prepared to deal with them.

I wish to touch on the medical card issue because I wish to repeat what I have said previously. Medical cards are issued to people who could earn up to €5,000 per week and the Government now is obliged to trawl back from that scenario. Since coming into government, an additional 217,000 medical cards have been issued and 43% of the population now have medical cards. At present, 1,950,000 people either have a medical card or a GP-only card and the taxpayers are paying for this. I do not agree with the manner in which it currently is being reviewed, whereby people are being written to unnecessarily, which is causing unnecessary alarm. I already have asked the Minister that the current procedure in place regarding how the review is carried out be stopped and a new system considered. This must be done urgently because unnecessary alarm is being caused to people and this issue certainly must be considered. I ask that the Leader would convey these views and if the Minister comes into this House, I certainly will convey those views to him myself.

Finally, I will touch on an issue raised by Senator Paul Coghlan regarding the banks and a situation I recently encountered. ACC Bank currently is closing down current accounts but one is entitled to hold onto one's loan account. However, the problems for farmers is that when they seek to arrange an overdraft account with an alternative bank, the security is held by ACC Bank. If, for example, someone has an 80-acre farm, the easiest way to deal with that is for 20 acres to be released to be used as security for the overdraft facility in the alternative bank. However, ACC Bank is not accommodating farmers in that regard. I ask that the Minister intervene, as unnecessary hardship is being imposed on people. They are being obliged to transfer everything, even when they have very good conditions and loans at present. They now are being forced to walk away from those conditions and are being put into further financial difficulty. The Minister should intervene on this issue.

I ask the Leader to raise the matter with the Minister for Finance at the earliest possible date.