SF would compensate families charged for private nursing home care, says McDonald

Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald said State has a responsibility to protect the public purse, but also protect its citizens. Picture: Peter Morrison/PA Wire

Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald has said her party would compensate families of public patients who were charged for private nursing home stays.

Ms McDonald also said a new report published over the weekend shows a strategy was “cooked up” at Government level around the hepatitis C scandal.

She said the State has a responsibility to protect the public purse, but also protect its citizens from harm, adding: “No government has the luxury of saying we’ll do one at the cost of another."

It comes after further details of the Government’s legal strategies when it comes to the most vulnerable individuals were highlighted in The Mail on Sunday.

Varadkar memo

It reported that Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, as minister for health in 2015, brought a memo to Cabinet which proposed removing redress entitlements of family members affected by the hepatitis C scandal.

It also said this proposal should remain secret, as public knowledge of a bid to change compensation arrangements could encourage further claims.

The hepatitis C scandal related to contaminated blood products that had been distributed in healthcare settings and led to the establishment of a tribunal of inquiry and a compensation scheme for those affected.

However, the plans did not proceed, and the tribunal set up to compensate victims continued to operate.

A spokesperson for the Taoiseach said that proposal was considered in the context of the deep recession that had hit health budgets at the time, and that “very difficult decisions” were being routinely taken.

Then-Health Minister Leo Varadkar 'discussed it with senior Cabinet colleagues'. Picture: Brian Lawless/PA Wire

Resources at the time were focused on patients, he said, and the decision would not have affected the entitlement to compensation of anyone infected with hepatitis C or HIV.

[Mr Varadkar] discussed it with senior Cabinet colleagues who agreed with him that the proposal should not proceed, and there was no Cabinet decision,” the spokesperson said.

It comes as the Government was last week urged by the Opposition to release documents relating to a failure to provide payouts to families of public patients who were charged for private nursing home stays from the 1970s until the late 2000s.

Estimates put the potential claims at €12bn relating to patients with medical cards who were improperly charged in public nursing homes, although Ms McDonald told RTÉ that these figures were “vastly overstated”.

In a bid to quell an escalating political storm, the three Government party leaders agreed that Attorney General Rossa Fanning would “look into this issue”. 

A report is expected to be given to Cabinet on Tuesday.