Disabled people protest outside Government Buildings in Dublin today.
(Photo :PA)
HEALTH CUTS WITHDRAWN
AS CABINET RIFT
EXPOSED:
The first meeting of the coalition
cabinet ahead of the new Dáil session, two weeks from now, had to face massive protest
from across the country to dramatic cuts in public health services announced in
peremptory fashion by the Health Service Executive on Friday as Health Minister,
Dr James Reilly, became the Invisible Man while the storm of protest raged
across the media over the weekend.
Senior
figures in the Labour Party half of the Coalition reacted strongly. Labour
Party chairman, Colm Keaveney, said the €130 million in cuts to home help and
services for high-dependency patients announced last week are unacceptable and
said he expected the Taoiseach to review the decision at a Cabinet meeting on
Tuesday.
Speaking on RTÉ radio soon after
the HSE announcement, Mr Keaveney said the cuts were unjust and should be
reviewed by the HSE and the Minister for Health Dr. James Reilly "as a matter
of urgency." “It is my belief that we can identify savings of €130 million
rather than focusing on an unjust cut. These cuts are in my view unacceptable
and the Minister and HSE should review them as a matter of urgency,” he said. He
said members of the Labour Party had contacted him with alarm and concern after
the cuts were announced. “I understand there is a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday
and I would hope and expect the Taoiseach would ensure we would review this
situation to the satisfaction of vulnerable people who are concerned about the
delivery of services,” he said. He was joined later by North Dublin TD, Aodhán
Ó Ríordáin and Tánaiste (Deputy Premier) Éamonn Gilmore who said it was
“regrettable” the HSE had announced cuts in services. “Every organisation,
every department and every service has to obviously work within budget,” he
added. Mr Gilmore said the priority would be to ensure services needed by
people requiring care and assistance would continue to be provided.
Against that background, Ministers
arrived for today's Cabinet meeting to face a poignant demonstration outside
Government Buildings in Dublin by a large number of disabled people in their
wheelchairs who stated their dismay in the reduction of their support services
which would leave many of them confined to institutions, at greater expense to the state,
than continuing with the current levels of service. Taoiseach (Prime Minister), Enda Kenny, avoided the protest by arriving early.
Of the eight cost-cutting
proposals in the HSE plan outlined last week, at least three will affect older
people or the disabled exclusively. Services for both groups are likely to be
seriously affected by a 600,000-hour cut in home help hours, as well as a
reduction of 200 home care packages and a €10 million reduction in hours for
personal assistants for people who need high levels of support trying to live
independently. Health minister, Dr James Reilly has consistently championed the
care of patients in the community in preference to long-term stays in hospital,
but advocacy groups predicted the effect of the cuts would be to increase
hospital admissions. “If this culture of homecare cuts
continues, children with life-limiting conditions will end up back in hospital
unnecessarily, which nobody wants and which costs nine times more than
homecare,” said Jonathan Irwin, chief executive of the Jack and Jill
Foundation.The HSE had said “the impact
of these reductions will be minimised by ensuring that services are provided
for direct patient care”.
The outcome of today's Cabinet
meeting was an embarrassing climbdown by Government with a withdrawal of the
€10M cut in Personal Assistants for disabled people. The repercussions,
political and financial, will continue as the €500M overrun in the health
department budget for this year will require more debate and controversial
decisions in the lead up to the December Budget for 2013 is put before Dáil
Éireann. Obviously, with such a big hole in the Health budget, the argument for cuts will continue inside the Cabinet.
The consequences for the Labour
Party leadership will be significant as Colm Keaveney's sharp condemnation of
the proposed health cuts resonates with unrest and dissatisfaction within the
Labour Party rank and file membership. Keaveney was elected Chair of the Party
at this year's Annual Conference, in Galway, despite the hierarchy's determined efforts and
bureaucratic manoeuvres to prevent him being elected which caused uproar at the
conference centre while outside, several
thousand protesters from various political and civil groups besieged the
building.
At government level, so far there
has been no explanation from Minister Reilly of his failure to control expenditure
in his Department. His usual combative and "Lone Ranger" style of
politics strangely absent on this occasion. The issuing of the announcement via the HSE and the failure of Minister Reilly to alert Gilmore and the other Labour ministers including the two in the Health Department, Róisín Shorthall and
Kathleen Lynch, added considerably to the cabinet tensions.
The severity of Budget cuts in Ireland since the state was forced into a bailout situation by the European Central Bank and the EU Commission with the IMF added as third party, are part of a worldwide agenda of the robber Banks and the Capitalist Financial Elite to make the majority of the population pay for the criminal debasement of the financial sector which is the direct cause of the crisis in the developed capitalist countries, and in our particular case, the Eurozone. There is now a determined and organised agenda to destroy the social welfare structures of European states in the interests of the Criminal Bandit Elite.
While vicious hardship is being imposed all over Europe and the USA, the twin citadels of World Corporate Capitalism, 92,000 persons of the Criminal Elite have, between them, stashed more than $21 Trillion in tax havens across the globe. This shows that the financial "crisis" is being manipulated by these criminals to enrich themselves further at the direct expense of the rest of us and are boastful enough to declare publicly, as Mario Draghi, head of the ECB, said in an interview in the "Wall Street Journal", last year, "The European Social Model is over". This is a real challenge to the forces of the Left all over Europe which, regrettably, is not being met by the Irish Labour Party and European Social Democracy as a whole.
The severity of Budget cuts in Ireland since the state was forced into a bailout situation by the European Central Bank and the EU Commission with the IMF added as third party, are part of a worldwide agenda of the robber Banks and the Capitalist Financial Elite to make the majority of the population pay for the criminal debasement of the financial sector which is the direct cause of the crisis in the developed capitalist countries, and in our particular case, the Eurozone. There is now a determined and organised agenda to destroy the social welfare structures of European states in the interests of the Criminal Bandit Elite.
While vicious hardship is being imposed all over Europe and the USA, the twin citadels of World Corporate Capitalism, 92,000 persons of the Criminal Elite have, between them, stashed more than $21 Trillion in tax havens across the globe. This shows that the financial "crisis" is being manipulated by these criminals to enrich themselves further at the direct expense of the rest of us and are boastful enough to declare publicly, as Mario Draghi, head of the ECB, said in an interview in the "Wall Street Journal", last year, "The European Social Model is over". This is a real challenge to the forces of the Left all over Europe which, regrettably, is not being met by the Irish Labour Party and European Social Democracy as a whole.
FearFeasaMacLéinn
Áth Cliath/Dublin
Meanfhomhair/September 4 2012
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