Feargal Quinn (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate the Minister's presence, the effort he made and his consideration. However, I do not appreciate some of what he said. In his speech he indicated that he had urged all the private health insurers to do everything possible to keep down the cost of private health insurance. To me, that sounds a little like the Minister for transport saying 20 years ago that he had urged all the airlines to keep their costs down. It did not work. We paid £299 to go to London to the two existing airlines. The situation did not change until Ryanair came on the scene and we now pay approximately €19 instead.

I admire much of what Senator Cullinane said but I also disagree with him as I believe the marketplace will give us a better deal. The Minister's approach in saying that he has urged all the private health insurers to do everything they can to keep down the cost is a long way from what could happen. I do not think there is any evidence that new insurance companies ever refused to recruit older people. If there was any evidence it would have emerged and if insurance companies had evidence they would have made it known.

I am disappointed the Minister has not shown a greater degree of openness to the objectives of the Bill. Senator Ó Domhnaill urged him to accept the Bill in order that we could consider it on the next Stage. The diagnosis and prescription to help fix our broken health insurance market has been set down by the European Court of Justice. However, it seems that the Minister and his officials are deep in denial. The failure of the Department to adhere to a date for the regularisation of VHI’s unusual position suggests to me that it lives by the words of St. Augustine who pleaded for the Lord to make him pure but not just yet. There is evidence of such an approach by the Department.

The Minister might not like many aspects of the Bill but I am convinced that it contains core elements that are needed in order to restore stability to the health insurance market. The kind of stability to which I refer is stability of membership and pricing. When it comes to Government policy and the functioning of the health insurance sector, the consumer needs to take centre stage in the Department’s thinking, which is not the case at present. Policy decisions affecting the health insurance sector should no longer be driven or influenced by decisions which are taken solely in the best interests of the VHI or the HSE. I thank the Minister for attending and giving the Bill his attention. However, it would be better to leave the Bill on the Order Paper so that we could consider Committee Stage changes at a later point. I got a lot of help from Brian Hunt and Anne Ó Broin and wish to mention their names.