Results 21-40 of 25,953 for speaker:David Cullinane

Health Insurance (Amendment) Bill 2024: Committee and Remaining Stages (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: The point is well made.

Health Insurance (Amendment) Bill 2024: Instruction to Committee (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: I will absolutely support these amendments. This is something for which we have collectively called for some time. I will make a broader point that there have been very significant developments over the past number of years in supporting women in menopause, including the establishment of menopause clinics. A whole range of other measures were put in place. The Minister outlined other...

Health Insurance (Amendment) Bill 2024: Second Stage (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: This is an annual Bill to review the risk equalisation mechanism that supports the community-based health service insurance market. It revises the stamp duty levy on policies and the risk equalisation credits payable to insurers for 2025. Risk equalisation as a principle ensures that costs are constant across the lifespan of the individual. It seeks to ensure, where possible, that age,...

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: I have always raised issues in my constituency very robustly and, I hope, very fairly with the Taoiseach and Ministers. I am growing very impatient, however, regarding the issue of Waterford Airport and the need for State funding to extend its runway. There is a lot of very harsh feeling in Waterford regarding comments made by the Minister of State, Deputy Lawless, last week, when he used...

Public Health Service Staffing: Motion (Resumed) [Private Members] (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: Hear, hear.

Public Health Service Staffing: Motion (Resumed) [Private Members] (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: I thank the Labour Party for tabling this motion and giving us an opportunity to discuss this important issue. In all the discussions on budget 2023 and budget 2024, as the Minister knows, I pointed out robustly that the health service was not getting the funding it needed to stand still, that we were running significant deficits, and that at some point, a cheque would have to be written to...

Public Health Service Staffing: Motion (Resumed) [Private Members] (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: That recruitment embargo was put in place by the head of the HSE. I did not interrupt the Minister. I have my time. The Minister can dispute what I am saying but it is indisputable. The HSE said there was a need to contain costs. He sent communications to the health service that he was putting in place a recruitment embargo with very limited exceptions relating to final-year nurses and...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Issues and Challenges relating to Cardiology: Irish Cardiac Society (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: I welcome our witnesses and thank them for the extensive briefing documents they submitted, as well as the opening statement and the asks they have of this committee. I will start with the national strategy because it is important. The most important point the witnesses made in their presentation is we do not have an overarching national strategy and have not for five years. Just for the...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Issues and Challenges relating to Cardiology: Irish Cardiac Society (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: I thank Professor McAdam. I see many of the critical issues the witnesses identified are issues common to a lot of areas we are hearing about. One is the lack of comprehensive national registries. That seems to be a problem across a whole range of diseases. Do the witnesses think there would be a step-change in that if we moved to electronic medical records and digitising the health...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Issues and Challenges relating to Cardiology: Irish Cardiac Society (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: I thank Professor McAdam. I move to diagnostics, because it is one of those areas in healthcare where the National Treatment Purchase Fund does not publish the diagnostic waiting lists or indeed community waiting lists, which it should. Very often we have to keep digging and asking parliamentary questions to get some sense of how bad they are. We know that in some cases they are not great....

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Issues and Challenges relating to Cardiology: Irish Cardiac Society (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: There is a business case that was developed by the national heart programme around cardiac imaging.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Issues and Challenges relating to Cardiology: Irish Cardiac Society (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: I am taking it from Dr. Murphy's response that would be more insourcing and more public availability in the public service, as opposed to outsourcing. However, the fundamental point is more capacity.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Issues and Challenges relating to Cardiology: Irish Cardiac Society (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: I thank Dr. Murphy. Our time is limited and I have one more question to put. An issue that is coming up a lot at this committee when we have witnesses before us is the recruitment embargo that was in place and the still very limited recruitment for 2024. The witnesses' opening statement refers to "... significant workforce issues including an embargo on filling vacant positions since...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Issues and Challenges relating to Cardiology: Irish Cardiac Society (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: Just to let the Chair know, a health motion is being taken in the Dáil and some of us will have to leave to speak on it.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Staffing Levels in the HSE: Fórsa (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: The witnesses are very welcome and I thank them for their opening statement. I ask them to clear up some confusion in this area. Anyone listening to this discussion in recent months will have seen a lot of smoke and mirrors. On the one hand, the Minister for Health has been telling us we have never had it so good with all of this recruitment that we have seen over the last number of years,...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Staffing Levels in the HSE: Fórsa (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: When the Minister for Health was before the committee last week I put it to him that if he disputed the figures from the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, SIPTU, Fórsa or any other organisation on suppressed, lost or decommissioned posts, he should provide the real number and I did not get an answer. Is the lack of an answer because the data is not being captured or does the HSE...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Staffing Levels in the HSE: Fórsa (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: I accept that. Ms Connolly spoke about a lack of transparency about the data underpinning the pay and numbers strategy and the other healthcare trade unions have made a similar point. She made another important point, which should be noted, that HSE HR was directed to essentially switch off the vacancies on the SAP payroll system. If vacant posts are switched off and gone, is the...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Staffing Levels in the HSE: Fórsa (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: Are these posts that were marked as vacant on the HSE's SAP payroll system?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Staffing Levels in the HSE: Fórsa (23 Oct 2024)

David Cullinane: They have just vanished.