Govt to announce scheme to repay nursing home residents

The Government is due to announce details today of a scheme to repay hundreds of millions of euro to medical card holders who were illegally charged for nursing home care.

Yesterday, the Cabinet approved plans to reimburse around 22,000 nursing home residents and the estates of another 40,000 who have died over the past six years.

However, ministers are believed to have decided to impose a statute of limitations to avoid repayments to people who died prior to December 1998.

The repayments will require new legislation and a new budgetary estimate to release the €500m to €1bn that will be needed to meet the compensation bill.

The practice of charging medical card holders for beds in public nursing homes, which began in 1976, was halted late last year after the Attorney General warned it was legally unsound.

The Supreme Court subsequently rejected an attempt by the Government to retrospectively legalise the charges, saying it was unconstitutional.