Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)
Link to this: Individually | In context

The Sustaining Progress agreement provides for the payment of general round increases and increases recommended by the benchmarking body to public service workers, subject to a performance verification process in respect of each increase. No other cost increasing claims may be made or processed during the currency of the agreement. While the general round increases under Sustaining Progress have, in line with previous practice, been applied to the fees paid to chiropodists providing services under the chiropody scheme, the benchmarking increases have not been applied to those fees on the basis that the chiropodists participating in the scheme are private practitioners.

Generally speaking, fees paid to private health care practitioners for the provision of services to public patients are reviewed periodically and in that context I will ask my Department, in conjunction with the Health Service Executive, to look specifically at the current levels of fees paid to chiropodists participating in the chiropody scheme. In the meantime, I reiterate that it is inappropriate for chiropodists to charge a top up fee to elderly public patients who have been deemed eligible for services under the scheme. My Department wrote to the Health Service Executive on 26 January 2005 regarding the inappropriateness of these additional charges.