NURSING home owner representatives yesterday pledged to make long-stay care an election issue on the doorsteps.

THE Irish Nursing Homes Organisation fully supports the expansion and enhancement of the current inspection regime concerning nursing homes. However, the current HSE inspection system is totally unfair and deprives nursing home proprietors of any degree of natural justice whatsoever.

Nursing home owners are calling on the Health Service Executive to halt routine inspections of their premises pending improvements in the way standards are assessed.

THE owner of a north Dublin nursing home isreplacing public patients with private ones to pay for renovations, say relatives of residents there.

PRIVATE nursing homes are now raking in over €11 million a week, according to the latest details released in a national report yesterday.

There has been a dramatic slow down in the rate of increase in the supply of private nursing home beds, according to a survey of the industry published today by the Irish Nursing Homes Organisation

The Irish Nursing Homes Organisation has hit out at the HSE for not giving people enough information about the new Government grants.

The Irish Nursing Homes Organisation (INHO) has welcomed Minister for Finance Brian Cowen's comments that nursing home subvention payments will be increased as part of Budget 2007.

The Irish Nursing Homes Organisation has criticised the manner in which the HSE has this week handled the cases of the five nursing homes to which new admissions have been suspended.

The Health Service Executive has suspended the admission of new patients to at least five nursing homes following recent inspections of the facilities.

INEXPERIENCED staff are carrying out nursing home checks and signing off on inspections, according to an unpublished HSE report.

THE independent nursing homes inspectorate must be established as a matter of urgency, elderly advocates stressed yesterday.

THE funding system for elderly people in care is inequitable and unjust, the Irish Nursing Homes Organisation (INHO) said yesterday.

The body that represents private nursing homes around the country has slammed what it claims is an "inequitable and unjust" funding system for elderly people in care.

HEALTH Minister Mary Harney is expected to find out later this week if she can use Dáil privilege to publish the controversial report on the Leas Cross nursing home.

IN your report on the annual report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (September 28), the issues raised do indeed require taxpayers’ attention.

The Irish Nursing Homes Organisation (INHO) has challenged Minister for Health Mary Harney to explain why her department last year under spent by €31m on grants for nursing home residents.

The Irish Nursing Homes Organisation has today criticised what it regards as the Government’s failure to reform the Nursing Home Subvention scheme.

ONE in every 10 nursing home residents are being given “inappropriate medication” to deal with their dementia, it was claimed yesterday.

The Irish Nursing Homes Organisation (INHO) has condemned the Government’s failure to establish an independent inspectorate in the wake of the Leas Cross nursing home scandal.

The Irish Nursing Homes Organisation has accused the Government of breaking its promise on improving nursing home standards.

A YEAR after the Leas Cross nursing home scandal, the Government has failed to establish an independent health inspectorate despite promises to due so by the end of 2005.

THE Irish Nursing Homes Organisation is relieved at the recent admission by the Tánaiste that the overcrowding crisis in acute hospitals is a national emergency and that all available resources will have to be mobilised.

TÁNAISTE Mary Harney last night again defended her decision to fight the repayment of nursing home charges in at least two cases - saying claims for damages had forced her hand.

IN your issue of January 11 the Tánaiste and Health Minister Mary Harney refers to the introduction of a new regime of standards and inspections for nursing homes.

Tánaiste Mary Harney couldn’t represent the Government in the Dáil this morning because of a traffic jam outside Dublin, it emerged today.

The Tánaiste and Health Minister Mary Harney has promised that the threshold for nursing home subventions will be increased in next month's budget for the first time since 1993.

The Irish Nursing Homes Organisation has called on the Government to ensure that the promised social services inspectorate will be independent of the HSE.

MINISTER for Older People Seán Power admitted yesterday that the inspections of nursing homes are “ridiculous” — especially the advance warning given to private nursing homes.

NURSING home care standards are totally inadequate, too vague and open to interpretation, the Irish Nursing Homes Organisation (INHO) has argued.

THE Health Services Executive (HSE) is investigating up to 100 complaints made about private nursing homes in the past year.

The Irish Nursing Homes Organisation (INHO) has welcomed today’s commitment by the Taoiseach to establish an Independent Inspectorate for nursing homes before the end of the year.

UP to 10,000 pensioners could be entitled to demand repayments of €15-30,000 a year from the State for the cost of private nursing homes, claim legal experts.

IF the measure of a civilised society is how it cares for its senior citizens, then Ireland comes very badly out of an assessment based on that revealing yardstick.

NURSING home patients are being forced to pay over €1,000 each year for incontinence wear even though the Southern Health Board was told three years ago they should not be charged.

NURSING homes in Ireland cost between €600 and €700 a week, rising to €1,200 a week for more luxury-style care.

RESIDENTS of private nursing homes in Leinster are paying up to €500 more per week than patients of homes in Connacht.

MORE than 2,000 nursing home beds are empty while hospitals have no room to take more patients, a conference heard yesterday.