TAOISEACH BRIAN Cowen has said that “other, more unpalatable decisions” were proposed for inclusion in the Budget, besides the changes in medical card provision for persons over 70 years, but these were eventually dropped.
He refused to go into specifics yesterday, citing Cabinet confidentiality, but dropped a strong hint that the proposals were also in the health and social welfare area.
Speaking at a briefing for Irish journalists accompanying him on his trade mission to China, he acknowledged the Government’s authority had suffered because of the controversy, but said he hoped people would also decide he had shown leadership in addressing the issue rapidly and effectively.
“Hopefully that will be seen as leadership responding to an issue and therefore one’s authority, whilst it’s not as high as if you didn’t have the problem, it does mean that people will say, ‘Well, he used his authority to come up with a solution in double-quick time that met with broader public acceptance’.”
He apologised to anyone who may have been upset by the initial decision: “I’m very sorry if there was any distress caused, obviously, but the issue is that within a week we have sought to resolve that problem and resolve it in a way which will be sustainable for those who will be eligible in the future.”
The outcome, he insisted, “is that we will have a reformed scheme, we will have a more sustainable scheme; we won’t have, as we had under the old scheme, different amounts of money being paid for different types of patient.”
Asked whether he was worried about the “optics” of coming to China while pensioners protested at home, Mr Cowen said: “It was unavoidable; I had a commitment to come here and I deferred coming here in recognition of the need to find a solution to the issue that you’re talking about.”
The Government aware there would be criticism of the Budget: “We knew that it was going to be a difficult budget and that people would have a view on it.”
Asked whether the rest of the Budget would remain unchanged and whether there would be any modification of its educational aspects, particularly the rise in the pupil-teacher ratio, he replied: “We have to respect the budgetary parameters that we have.
“We’ve made that decision, it’s one of the decisions we had to make in the education area in order to compensate for other add-on costs which were unavoidable, and that’s the context in which these decisions are taken.”
Also yesterday, two Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown Fianna Fáil councillors called for a reversal of the medical card decision and said the Government climbdown had not gone far enough.
“It is appalling that life-long taxpayers now face the prospect of losing medical cards. The recent decision to scale back the announcement does not go far enough,” said Cllrs Gerry Horkan and Barry Conway in a statement.
“Many of those caught by the revised thresholds could not be fairly or realistically classified as rich. Many are long-standing supporters of Fianna Fáil and would have supported the party over the years through thick and thin.
“Taking medical entitlements away from the elderly is anathema to the values and traditions of Fianna Fáil. This proposed measure, together with other aspects of the Budget, such as increased class sizes, demonstrate that the Taoiseach and his Ministers are out of touch with the lives of ordinary people.”
Labour spokeswoman on health Jan O’Sullivan said yesterday that the Tánaiste, Mary Coughlan, had caused further concern to those over 70 by her comments in the Dáil yesterday morning on income thresholds for medical cards.
“Contrary to the impression given last night by Deputy Michael Lowry, there is no government commitment to index link the income levels for qualification for a card announced by the Government on Tuesday,” she said.
“All that was agreed, according to the Tánaiste, was that the income limits would be reviewed annually to take account of increases in the cost of living.”