What’s wrong with pensioners having to contribute towards their care?
When one considers the enormous cost of running nursing homes - a cost which is reflected in the fees being paid by private patients and their families - one wonders what all the fuss is about. (We mustn’t assume that all fee-paying patients are well-to-do. In many cases, adult offspring are struggling to pay charges between them).
Why on earth shouldn’t Cllr Gleeson’s late friend, and others in her situation, have to give up their pensions to help a little towards paying their way?
Surely that is what the pension was for! Indeed it may be considered a very inadequate contribution when one considers the high standard of care in our community hospitals.
How, in the name of sanity and commonsense, can Cllr Gleeson say the lady in question was “stripped of her dignity and her independence” when she was contributing her pension in the nursing home?
One assumes she had to live on the same pension while residing in her own home, when it wouldn’t have stretched quite so far.
The recent hiatus in the retention of such pensions didn’t come about because it was morally wrong to retain them.
It was caused by a legal technicality, which is being put right at enormous cost to the taxpayer.
Cllr Gleeson and his ilk might well ponder on the sheer size of the payback, estimated in billions.
This is the retrospective cost of keeping patients in care during the years in question - without their pension contributions.
Unlike Cllr Gleeson, I have no political agenda.
Sheila Griffin
Curragraigue
Blennerville
Tralee
Co Kerry
