Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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426. To ask the Minister for Health his plans to fully restore the practice support grants for general practitioners; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6593/16]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Under the General Medical Services (GMS) contract, general practitioners (GPs) are reimbursed by the HSE's Primary Care Reimbursement Service for a range of services they provide to medical card and GP visit card holders. In 2014, the HSE made payments of €428 million to GPs for the provision of general medical services for about 2 million people. The current fee and allowance rates are set out in the Health Professionals (Reduction of Payments to General Practitioners) Regulations 2013, S.I. 277/2013, which are available on-line at:

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As a consequence of the severe difficulties arising from the economic and fiscal crisis of recent years, it was necessary between 2009 and 2013 to reduce certain payments to health professions, including GPs under the GMS contract. These changes were given effect under the terms of the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (FEMPI) Act 2009. These reductions applied to all fees and allowances, including payments for special items.

It is not possible, within the fiscal space currently available to Government and the requirement to manage public expenditure in accordance with the EU's Stability and Growth Pact, to reverse FEMPI measures in one year. To do so would contravene EU fiscal rules and reverse the progress made in rescuing the economy from financial collapse which it recently faced. The Government has provided for the gradual unwinding of the FEMPI measures under the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Act 2015. Economic progress and fiscal consolidation in the years ahead will determine the scope and timing of the possible scale-back of the financial emergency measures.