Age Action condemns nursing home proposals
Age Action said today that it is concerned at the implications which the Nursing Homes Support Scheme Bill 2008, published today, will have for older people.
"If the Bill is introduced does it mean that an older person who is medically assessed as being in need of full-time medical and nursing care," said Age Action spokesman Eamon Timmins.
"But who refuses to sign up to the new charging arrangement whereby he would pay 80% of his income and up to 15% of the value of his estate, would be refused essential care by the State?”
"We are anxious that any legal problems relating to this Bill are sorted out before it is passed into law. It is in nobody’s interest that this legislation would face further legal challenges and delays.
Age Action said it believes the Bill represents a dramatic departure in the charging of vulnerable people for essential health services.
"In effect it means that people who had been paralysed by stroke or who are suffering from dementia will be charged in a completely different way to people who, for example, have a heart attack or are being treated for cancer," Mr Timmins said.
"We accept that the cost of private nursing home care was crippling families and a solution was needed. But we do not accept the solution forwarded by the Government."
Age Action said that it is deeply concerned that 22 months after such a significant piece of legislation was first announced by Minister Harney, that carers, older people and older people’s organisations such as Age Action have not been consulted.
