Danny Healy-Rae demands action on pension rebates and health waits

First of all, I want to welcome almost 30 retired nurses who gave their lives working in hospitals and for the care of people who are sick. I welcome them up here today to Dali and commend them for the service they gave. However, Taoiseach, I want to remind you, these are the very people who came back in 2022 and 21 to help out during the COVID period. You're taking money, demanding money out of their pensions. Now, these are the very people that are rebating their pensions. 2,700, 5,000, 25,000 for another man that had a high dependency job and these are the very people that you're trying to tax. You, Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and the Greens, that's what you're doing to these people up here, grand people. Now Taoiseach, I also want to ask you about the embargo in Kerry, where there's up to 120 ports yet to be filled over many, many months. And you're saying there's no embargo. Well, there is an embargo. Since last November, a girl came back from Australia somewhere last March and she won't, he won't give her her job back. That's the gospel truth. There's beds closed in all our hospitals, the district, the university hospital Kerry, they're closed and empty because there's no one to demand them. Respite care for the elderly, for people with physical and intellectual disabilities need to be greatly enhanced as it is almost existent. The means for care as alone needs to be abolished now. Waiting times for procedures and surgeries need to be reduced. Waiting for assessments for children with autism, ADHD and mental health issues has to be dealt with urgently as early intervention is paramount for these children. In fact, I received yesterday a response from Minister Donnelly, a PQ that I sent to him, and the answer he gave us is that the current waiting time is 30 months. God almighty Taoiseach, is that what you presided again over? Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and the Greens, and he had joined together. You told people in Kerry when you gave a speedy trip around there, that you had a way out of it, that you would appoint another minister, instead of Minister Donnelly, when the election will be over. Don't laugh at all, I could bring him here and through to the man that you taught. No bother in the world. Ambulance cover needs to be increased, not reduced. It was the only clinic that we had in Kerry, in Chile, over five or six months ago, and at the same time, he reduced the reimbursement that I got, that I was getting for taking people to Belfast to save their eyes. This is what he had been at Taoiseach, and this is what he presided over, and no matter how much, he'll try to disentangle from each other. Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and the Greens, he had the one crowd, he might as well name yourself, get a new party, because that's what he had, he had the one crowd, and he took on the Greens for to get ministerial and teaching and tarnished reports for yourselves. That's what he's doing. Well, they liked that, Deputy. Well, look, thanks very much. I was in Kerry, and there was nothing speedy about it, actually. I was there for most of the day. Sorry, now, hang on a second. You have to give me a little bit of a chance. I was there, and indeed, when I was driving by on the road, I saw this very large, I don't know what it was, but like a port-a-cabin type thing, with your face emblazoned right across it, asking people to vote, so you're clearly ready for battle. No, it wasn't a lorry I saw. So you're clearly ready for battle. You're clearly ready for battle. And look, look, look. And he didn't cut through 26,000. And he put more bicycles into it than the bicycle ship. Can I firstly welcome the retired nurses, hello there, from University Hospital Kerry, from Kerry here today, and thank them for their service in relation to the health service. And I'll certainly have a word with them in a moment about some of the issues that you've raised there, because I'm not across the detail of that, and it doesn't tally with my information, but I'll have a word with them in a moment. Secondly, look, I accept that when it comes to the health service, of course the health service has to live within an allocation, and the allocation is larger than it has ever been. It's a hell of a lot larger than when I was Minister for Health. Now it's gone from about 16 billion to about 25 billion. But the truth does also matter, because we do have funding in place now to hire thousands more people to work in the health service under the leadership of Minister Donnelly. And as of September 2024, there were 27,744 more staff working in the health service than there were when this government of Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and the Greens came to office. And that is a 23% increase. So there's 9,185 more nurses and midwives. There's 4,160 more health and social care professionals. And there's 3,479 more doctors and dentists. And I'll get through the figures, but I've no doubt in Kerry Hospital that means more staff, more nurses, more doctors than there were only a few years ago. And I accept we need to continue to grow those numbers to support our frontline health services. And that's why we have funding here in Corlea for around 7,000 more people between the end of this year and next year as well. You mentioned the issue of the carers, and I'm glad you did, because the means test is mean, and we do need to overhaul it and reform it. And that's why my colleague Minister Humphreys has a piece of work that will be concluded by the end of the year in relation to the whole means testing of our carers. And we'll all have a chance, including you and everybody else in this House, to put forward the proposals to carers in the days ahead as to what we would do to support them over the next number of years. And I'm proud of a number of the measures that we have taken under Minister Humphrey's leadership in terms of providing additional payments to our carers before Christmas, as well as the double child benefit payment being provided today, the double pension payment being provided last week, the fuel allowance lump sum payment that will be provided this week, and many more measures that I know make a real difference to people in County Kerry. And I met them in Kerry. I met them in Le Stoll. I met them in Tralee. I met them in Killarney. And I met them with a very good man called Billy O'Shea. In relation to assessments of needs, we're also, you need to make more progress here, and you're right in relation to that. And that's why when the Labour Party brought forward a proposal based on Cara Darmody, the young girl from Tipperary's advocacy, around utilising capacity in the private sector while building up capacity in the public sector, that's what we've done. And that has seen now well more than a thousand additional children with special needs get access to assessments of need this year. And I accept that's a model we need to continue. Thanks for the real point. We're living in promises and have been living in promises for a very long time. And when you say that you and this one and that one are going to do something, it will be after the election, we'll have to wait to see who's there. But I have to say to you, when are we going to react? When are we going to lift the embargo? Because the facts are, day after day, young boys and girls that are trained to be nurses and trained to be carers and trained to be GPs, they're leaving the country. Because there has been an embargo for 12 months now since last November. You can't deny it. It has happened. It is happening. So many ports are on the field, and there's so many beds empty because you can't have the beds if you don't have stuff to fill them. And that's, that's what's happening. And you see, even, even as we're speaking here today, they're flying out. And there's beds empty that we're calling for. Even an ICU bed, that was not to be got yesterday in the most of the country, only up here in Dublin. You had Mr. Minister Dunley saying that he had reduced the waiting time for Catholics to be done from three years to three months in Dublin. What have he done in Kerry? He closed down the unit and he cancelled the insurance to the utterly criminal so that they couldn't act. That's the God's gospel truth. Okay. Thank you. Teeshan. Well, thanks very much, Deputy. So, look, you are right. There was a period of time during the year where we did have to put restrictions in terms of hiring new posts in the health service, because they'd hired many, many more thousands of people than actually had been budgeted for. And we worked our way through that. And as I say, there are lots and lots and lots more people working in the health service now, in the public health service, including in Kerry. In fact, there's around 410 additional staff in Kerry Hospital today, and I think an increase of around 177 nurses during the lifetime of this government. And when it comes to reducing our wait times, we are making progress. We're one of the few countries in Europe that are actually seeing waiting times fall over the last two years. And that fall has happened in Kerry too. Let me assure you, the waiting time... Well, let me assure you, Deputy, let me assure you, the waiting time for cataract procedures in Kerry has fallen this year compared to last year, and it will continue to fall. No, you know why it is? You know why it is? You know why it is? Well, maybe... It's nothing for us. What do you do for them? It's where you're paying for the bus. The reality of the situation is we are reducing wait times. We have opened up more ophthalmology capacity in the southwest. You've pointed out to additional capacity that exists in this jurisdiction that doesn't require you to bring anyone out of the jurisdiction. And we will continue to do more and drive down waiting times further.