Cabinet to meet over medical-card crisis
The deepening crisis over the scrapping of automatic medical cards for the elderly will top the Cabinet’s agenda tomorrow as it meets for the first time since the Budget.
Taoiseach Brian Cowen is facing mounting pressure to reverse the contentious decision after Fianna Fáil tonight suffered yet another resignation just days after one of its backbenchers quit.
Midleton councillor and three-time mayor Billy Buckley said the party was out of touch with voters and branded the cutbacks a savage and cruel attack on pensioners.
And Kerry South deputy Jackie Healy Rae, one of three Independent TDs involved in a pact with the Fianna Fáil-led coalition, said he would not support the proposal in the Dáil.
Cabinet ministers will meet in the morning ahead of a Fianna Fáil parliamentary party gathering.
A spokesman for Health Minister Mary Harney said: “The Cabinet will discuss all matters surrounding the issue.”
In a further sign of internal revolt Midleton town councillor Billy Buckley became the second Fianna Fail politician to quit over the medical card crisis.
The party veteran – a member for 14 years – said he could no longer support the coalition, just days after Wicklow TD Joe Behan turned Independent.
“There’s no way that I could any longer remain a member of Fianna Fáil or support any government or any party who come up with those proposals that can only be described as a punishment for up to nearly 140,000 OAPs,” Mr Buckley, 50, said.
“In my book, it’s a savage and cruel attack on the nation’s elderly.
“I think the Government is completely out of touch with the people that they are supposed to service. One major failing was that they failed to listen to their backbenchers and in particular they are failing to listen to the councillors they have out there on the ground.”
Suggesting cracks in the coalition, Green Party TD Paul Gogarty said the only way to end the fear and confusion around the issue was to scrap the plan.
“While the vast majority of over-70s are not affected by the revised medical card scheme, the news has caused our elderly much pain and distress,” Mr Gogarty said.
“At this stage it would be far better to abolish the proposal than to try and explain the intricacies and subject them to means testing.”
In a bid to quell a backbench revolt Mr Cowen is attempting to redraft the plan and reach a compromise with doctors.
The Taoiseach delayed his departure to China by two days to try and sort out the controversy and held talks with the Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) yesterday.
The Competition Authority, however, said the IMO cannot negotiate with the Government on GPs’ fees to try to end the crisis as it would breach competition law.
But the body said the Government was not prevented from consulting with the doctors.
Labour Party deputy leader Joan Burton branded the IMO issue farcical and chaotic.
“The government can come up with all the Plan Bs or Plan Cs it wants but they are all entirely unworkable,” she said.
“This whole issue has descended into a farcical and chaotic situation at this point.
“The only option is to reverse the original Budget measure.”
Public representatives across the country have been inundated with calls from concerned residents since the Budget reforms were revealed.
Green Party councillors are expected to hold talks on Wednesday to debate the provisions.
Energy Minister and party TD Eamon Ryan said the concerns of his party’s councillors would be listened to and would inform the Cabinet’s position.
“That meeting will be listened to and will feed into the general Government reflection on concerns being raised,” he said.
Meanwhile Age Action Ireland is hosting a public meeting tomorrow to give older people a chance to explain to politicians how the abolition of the automatic entitlement affects them.
