HSE accused of politicising medical card information
Mr Kenny has written to HSE chief executive Professor Brendan Drumm to complain about six incidents of the practice.
The HSE strongly denied that members of the public were being told to access the party political website rather than the executive’s own.
However, Mr Kenny said Fine Gael workers had called five HSE offices and been directed to the political site on all occasions.
“This is outrageous politicising of consumer information. A constituent of mine informed me that his request for information from the HSE regarding GP visit cards was met with a referral to the website www.medicalcard.ie.
“This website was set up by Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats, contains political logos of the two parties and gives the distinct impression that this card information is at the behest of two political parties only.
“On checking with five other HSE regional offices with a request for similar information, HSE officials in each case referred to the same website. Consumer information must never be politicised in such a disgraceful manner.
“The HSE’s own website contains adequate information on medical cards and if this needs to be made more user-friendly, the HSE should see to that. Referrals to party political websites are clearly unnecessary and a blatant advert for this Government.
“I regard this as an affront to the right of the Irish people to attain State information without political influence and the practice should cease immediately,” he said.
A HSE spokesman called on Mr Kenny to back up his allegations with evidence.
“If Mr Kenny would like to give us the names of officials he claims are directing people to this site, then we will investigate that.
“But we cannot look into very vague claims. All the information that is needed by the public is available on our website, www.hse.ie, and I would advise people to use that,” he said.
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
