Inquiry into illegal charges to hear from Martin

The Minister for Enterprise and Employment, Mr Martin, is to give evidence next week to the official inquiry established into the background of the illegal deduction of money from patients with medical cards for their care in State-run nursing homes.

Mr John Travers, the former head of Forfás, has been asked by the Minister for Health, Ms Harney, to carry out an inquiry into "who knew what and when" in relation to the illegal charges levied on elderly patients in long-term care.

Mr Martin, who was minister for health for four years until last September, has said that he was never shown a legal opinion provided to the Department of Health in the spring of 2003 by a health board which suggested that the charges were illegal.

Mr Martin has also claimed that he was absent from a key meeting in the Gresham Hotel in Dublin on December 16th, 2003, between top Department of Health officials and senior executives of the health boards at which the issue of long-stay charges was discussed.

The Minister has declined to comment on the issue in recent days following the decision of the Supreme Court to reject the attempt by the Government to legalise retrospectively the charges levied on elderly patients.

The opposition has, however, sought to draw Mr Martin into the controversy.

Mr Martin has said it would be inappropriate for him to comment while the official inquiry was under way.

However, it is understood that he will meet Mr Travers in the early part of next week to discuss his knowledge of the illegal charges.

Ms Harney told reporters yesterday that she expected to receive the report in the first week of March, which will be before the by-elections in Meath and Kildare.

The Fine Gael leader, Mr Enda Kenny, alleged in the Dáil on Thursday that Mr Martin had failed to act while minister for health on the problem of the illegal charges even though he knew that the State had no power to make such deductions.

"Deputy Martin was deemed to have left a meeting when the matter was discussed."

"His two Ministers of State were present, and it seems that the former minister for health and children was in full possession of that information and sought not to act on it," Mr Kenny told the Dáil.

Meanwhile, the Cabinet is expected to discuss on Tuesday how the Government will respond to the Supreme Court ruling, which could see the State having to refund between €500 million and €2 billion to elderly residents in public nursing homes.

The Department of Health is working on a scheme to administer such repayments.