Varadkar urges banking inquiry to complete work

Minister for Health Leo Varadkar has urged the Oireachtas banking inquiry to complete its work and publish a report by next January.

The committee held an emergency meeting at the weekend in response to fear of members that their work could potentially collapse. It agreed to put a special team in place to consider the draft final report drawn up by staff but considered by some committee members to be weak and incoherent.

Mr Varadkar said it was very important, given the amount of public money spent on the inquiry, that it reported by its deadline early next year. The estimated €4-5 million cost of the investigation would buy “a lot of home helps and homecare packages,” he pointed out.

Members of the committee had also put a lot of work into the inquiry and missed out on constituency duties as a result, he said.

Speaking to reporters, Mr Varadkar also said the Fine Gael manifesto for the next general election would contain a paragraph on abortion but this hadn't been agreed yet.

The Minister confirmed some managers in voluntary hospitals and health agencies will be allowed to keep top-up payments if they pre-dated 2010 and were a contractual commitment.

The top-up would be retained for the particular post-holder only and any future appointee would have to stay within public-sector pay policy.

Mr Varadkar said it was important to put a stop to the practice and if it had not been halted, the costs could have escalated into millions over many years.

In future, where a voluntary agency fails to comply with pay policy, it will have any additional funds deducted from their income.