Long-stay charges and accountability
Rabbitte challenged the Government over the long-stay charges fiasco, its potential cost to taxpayers, political accountability and the findings of the Travers inquiry. The Tánaiste defended commissioning the inquiry after discovering that crucial information had been omitted from a report to Cabinet. She refused to publish South Eastern Health Board legal advice, saying it covered intertwined matters before the courts and disclosure could harm the State; she said failure to seek earlier Attorney General advice had delayed correction and cost more than €100 million.
I wish to return to the issue of long-stay charges. We do not know what this cock-up will cost the taxpayer. The Government cannot tell us, but it estimates it could be up to €2 billion. We have had no political accountability from the Government, while one civil servant has been promoted sideways. As the House rises for the Easter recess, the Government is clearly calculating that media interest will wane, the taxpayer will cough up and nobody will be responsible. The Tánaiste implied political culpability when she stated that systemic maladministration did not just involve officials. Now she retreats behind the Travers report for shelter and states that it found no Minister culpable. Travers found no paper record that states that the former Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Martin, was sufficiently briefed. However, it is admitted in the report that two Ministers of State knew about it. The Minister of State, Deputy O'Malley, stated that not only did he know about it, but that he understood that "they would give rise to significant legal, operational, financial and political implications." He went on to state mysteriously that the issues involved did not fall within his area of responsibility in the Department, so he never went back to them. He is the Minister of State with responsibility for mental health and there are many people within that area. However, I presume he means that the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Martin, was responsible. We know the Minister of State, Deputy Callely, knew because the Travers report states that he told the Taoiseach about it. However, the Minister claims he did not know.
Mr. Kelly states that he briefed the Minister twice and we know that documents were sent to him the night before, spelling out the implications. However, the Minister says he never read them. Yet when the Tánaiste asked Mr. Kelly to prepare a report for her for Cabinet, we know that Mr. Kelly had a secret meeting with the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Martin. Why would Mr. Kelly want to compare notes with a Minister who knows nothing about it? I am bemused by that and we have had no explanation. The Tánaiste has made her reputation as a purveyor of high standards in politics. Yet when she found out about all this, she decided to legislate to make it legal retrospectively. When the Supreme Court struck it down, she stated that she welcomed it because it brought clarity to the issue. She then implied in this House that Ministers knew. She then commissioned the Travers report for shelter and defended the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Martin, by claiming that he knew nothing about it. How can anyone who has read the Travers report reach that conclusion? How can the Tánaiste be happy to serve in Government with him and his two Ministers of State? Unlike the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Martin, the Ministers of State had the guts to admit they knew all about it.
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I did not commission the Travers report to shelter anybody from anything. The inquiry was set up on 16 December, long before there was any decision by the Supreme Court or even a decision by the President to refer the Bill to the Supreme Court. I established the Travers inquiry because I became aware on 15 December that the report given to me to take to the Cabinet was incorrect in some crucial respects. It did not inform the Government that a letter had been drafted to be sent to the Attorney General which was never issued. I felt that was a serious omission on behalf of the Secretary General of my Department.
We did not know the extent of the knowledge in the Department of Health and Children going back to 1976. The Travers report found that the basic decision that caused the problem was that made in 1976. At that time, the legal advisors in the Department cautioned against doing what was done. The error goes back to 1976 and that is why the State is exposed for certain cases, such as someone with an unsound mind. That is why the figures go beyond the Supreme Court figures of around €500 million and why they might go as high as €2 billion. A total of 316,000 citizens were resident in these institutions between 1976 and 2004. I have already said that there is a serious conflict of interest in the report between the former Minister, Deputy Martin, and the Secretary General, Mr. Michael Kelly. I have also said that I will not adjudicate on a conflict of evidence as it would be wrong of me to do so. Mr. Travers drew his own conclusions and whether we like the report or not, we should all be objective enough to accept an independent report when we get it. If we do not like what it states, that is a reflection on us. Mr. Travers stated that the bulk of the responsibility for what happened lay in serious failings in public administration. He stated that Ministers should have been more probing and should have asked more questions, but he was in no doubt on where the blame lay.
I became Minister at the Department of Health and Children on 30 September 2004 and I was never briefed either orally or in writing about this matter by any official at the Department. I find that extraordinary if it was of such concern. In a memo written for the Government in early December, the Department maintained that these charges were legally defensible. We all know from the Travers report that could not be anyone's view when we see the legal evidence that was available to the Department going back nearly 30 years.
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It is entirely indefensible that the Tánaiste was not correctly and fully briefed. I suggest that the only reason is that there was collusion at the top political and administrative level of the Department not to confront this issue. That is the reason she was not briefed and that is the legacy she inherited from the former Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Martin, whom she now protects. There is no point in giving the impression that the Travers report concluded that Ministers were in the clear. It does no such thing. People who are not familiar with reading senior Civil Service English might be led to believe that. It is in black and white that two Ministers of State knew about the situation and that the Secretary General talked to the Minister. The Tánaiste admits that there is a conflict of evidence between the Minister and his former Secretary General. She then tells us piously that she will not adjudicate. By God, she was never slow to adjudicate when she was over here. She never stopped adjudicating. Now she does not want to adjudicate when it is obvious that there was collusion in the Department at the highest level to avoid confronting this issue. They thought it would remain buried but it was raised on the Government side of the House. The Tánaiste sought to legislate retrospectively to make it legal. She played well and received great kudos for that. She has a protective shield around her that does not apply to the rest of us but at least she confronted the matter. I admit that, but how can she let it lie at that, pushing aside one civil servant for a bill that will cost the taxpayer, according to her, up to €2 billion? The Minister, Deputy Martin, continues to sit beside her and after all she said in Opposition, she is prepared to live with that.
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It is simply unconscionable. I ask the Tánaiste again whether she will publish the advice provided to her by the Southern Eastern Health Board.
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As I told the House yesterday, the advice from the South Eastern Health Board cannot be published for legal reasons because there are cases pending and we would jeopardise the position of the State and taxpayers——
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I dealt with this issue when Deputy Rabbitte raised it yesterday but I will respond again. The legal advice deals with a number of issues, including nursing home subventions and those in other forms of institution. They are the subject of legal proceedings which will be coming before the courts shortly. Whatever about Deputy Rabbitte or how it might help my popularity, I am not going to jeopardise the position of this State in any legal proceedings, if that is the advice I receive from the Attorney General. The tragedy is that the Attorney General's advice was not sought going back to 1976——
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——and, particularly, more recently. A decision was made at a meeting in December 2003——
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A decision was made at a meeting in December 2003 that the Attorney General's advice would be sought.
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All the papers were prepared to get that legal advice. The tragedy is that that letter did not issue from the Secretary General of the Department of Health and Children because even if we had corrected this matter a year ago we could have saved ourselves over €100 million. That is the reality.