Health: Varadkar disputes Howlin’s claims about size of budget

Minister for Health Leo Varadkar has disputed claims made by his Cabinet colleague, Minister for Public Expenditure Brendan Howlin, about the size of the health budget.

Mr Howlin told the Dáil in his Budget speech health spending was being increased by almost €900 million next year and would exceed €13 billion for the first time since the economic crash.

Mr Varadkar, briefing journalists later, disputed this, saying his budget was still about €1 billion off its pre-bust peak.

While declining to say Mr Howlin was wrong Mr Varadkar, when asked if he felt the health budget was at pre-crisis levels, responded: “Not in my view”.

He also clarified that any negotiating with medical organisations on extending free GP care to under-12s will take place in the context of wider talks on an overall new GP contract, rather than before these.

The Irish Medical Organisation had sharply criticised the budget announcement that free GP care is to be extended to older children by the last quarter of next year. It "simply isn't possible" to introduce the measure in the absence of a new contract being negotiated to replace the current one, which is 40 years old, the union said.

Mr Varadkar said he had no doubt the IMO would “drive a hard bargain” and said the union got 80 per cent more than was budgeted when the under-6s contract was negotiated this year.

The €13.175 billion announced by Mr Howlin for the health budget in 2016 is less than €100 million more than he announced a year ago.

Fianna Fáil accused Mr Varadkar of "dishonest spinning" but the Department said the comparison is skewed by accounting changes since the health vote was returned from the HSE to it this year.

It says the actual increase in spending for next year is €880 million, of which about €600 million wil go on a supplementary budget to fund overspending by the HSE this year.

Minister for Health Leo Varadkar described the remaining €280 million as the largest any department had achieved. He admitted the scope for new initiatives in 2016 was modest and existing resources would have to be carefully targeted.

More money will be found for the extension of GP care, speech and language therapy for children, mental health services, the implementation of the forthcoming national maternity strategy and ambulance staff. The detail of these initiatives won’t be known until the HSE publishes its service plan later this year.

Minister of State for Primary Care Kathleen Lynch said funding for the Fair Deal nursing home scheme was being increased on a like-for-like basis from 4874 million to €940 million and this would ensure the waiting time for places was kept down to four weeks.

Asked whether the other organisation for family doctors, the National Association for GPs, would be invited to take part in negotiations on extending free GP care, Ms Lynch said the IMO represented the majority of GPs and she wasn’t sure it would be helpful to allow any other group to join in.

The IMO said it was nonsense for the Minister to suggest there was a substantial increase in his budget and the spending proposed would hardly be sufficient to maintain services at current levels.