SEANAD REPORT:THE NUMBER of people over 70 years of age who would lose their medical cards was likely to be more than three times the percentage that had been stated, Alan Kelly (Lab) said.
According to some calculations, it looked like it would be around 14 per cent who would be affected.
Joe O’Toole (Ind) did not find it credible that, according to a Department of Finance website, there were only 20,000 people in the over-70 category with annual incomes of more than €36,000. He also wondered how Government could regard such people as being well off.
The original Budget proposal, “bad as it was”, had been based on net salary. This had been changed to gross income. Those on the Government side of the House should go to their parliamentary party meetings and “lift out of it the people putting forward that kind of stuff”, Mr O’Toole said.
Alex White (Lab) said the Taoiseach needed to look the Irish people in the eye and be clear, honest and candid with them about what precisely was happening in the country and in our economy.
Eoghan Harris (Ind) drew an angry reaction from the Fine Gael benches when he said that the main Opposition party was compromised by the fact that its health spokesman was involved in negotiations on behalf of vested interests.